Malaysia
Background
The Malaysian government has established a dedicated agency, the Council for Anti-Trafficking in Persons and Anti-Smuggling of Migrants, MAPO.
The National Anti-Human Trafficking Action Plan (NAPTIP 3.0) expired in 2025.
There have been five import bans issued on Malaysian corporations by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and one corporation investigated by U.S. Homeland Security Investigations.
Malaysia has complex supply chains but despite actions by enforcement agencies in the United States, there has been no enforcement against local corporations by Malaysian enforcement agenicies.
MAPO has not published any reports further to 2022 and 2023.
In 2025, the Ministry of Home Affairs launched the anti-trafficking in persons and anti-smuggling of migrants integrated data system with the aim of mitigating human trafficking to give the government “a more holistic picture of human trafficking”.
The Malaysian government recently introduced the Gig Workers Act 2025 to prevent exploitation of gig workers.
Bank Negara contains Malaysia’s financial intelligence unit which does investigate illicit money from human trafficking, however it is unclear whether any monies arising from forced labor caused investigations.
Other Key Factors
Freedom of association and collective bargaining is active in Malaysia but there are repeated problems of collusion between recruitment agents, unions and corporations.
Wage theft is a significant issue.
To understand Malaysia’s situation more fully, we show the percentage of the population using the internet in Malaysia, along with the highest usage and lowest usage countries amongst the G20 members (Saudi Arabia and India).
Malaysia’s remittances are also shown with the respective highest and lowest inflow remittance countries in the G20 (India/Saudi Arabia) and the highest and lowest outflow countries in the G20 (US/Philippines). Keep in mind that remittance estimates are often an under count of actual remittance volume.(Graph unit is in Billion US$)
Malaysia’s Role in the Global Economy and Its Supply Chains
Trade flows from The Observatory of Economic Complexity