KUALA LUMPUR. Malaysia — Deputy Energy, Water and Communications Minister Datuk Shaziman Abu Mansor said this week that mobile phone users caught sending threats or obscene messages with pictures can be fined $14,700 or jailed for up to one year, or both.

The deputy minister said the compulsory registration of the estimated 15 million cellphone users in Malaysia would make it easy to identify senders. Shaziman made these remarks during questioning before the Malaysian Senate on Thursday.

This was the latest of Shaziman's recent statements expressing official displeasure with offensive content.

On May 14, the official Malaysian news agency reported that after a blogger said that the Malaysian Prime Minister had fainted at a public function, Shaziman said, "I have not read the report in the blogsite but if there are elements of slander, action can be taken under the penal code. This comes under the Internal Security Ministry." Shaziman also said his ministry could cooperate with the Internal Security Ministry to identify the blogger.

In April. Shaziman suggested that bloggers using locally hosted websites may be asked to register with authorities, saying that registration was one of the measures the government was considering to prevent the spread of negative or malicious content on the Internet.