The use of drones by smugglers to avoid detection by the authorities has made it more challenging to combat smuggling activities and intrusions into national waters, the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) said.
Its acting deputy director-general of operations, Zawawi Abdullah, said smugglers previously relied only on plain sight observation or the help of lookouts to monitor enforcement movements.
“Now, they launch drones up to 30 minutes earlier to survey the area with wider coverage,” he said at a press conference in Putrajaya today, Buletin TV3 reported. “They are even able to detect whether enforcement assets are nearby or not.”
The first known attempt at smuggling through a drone took place in August last year when a drone was used to deliver drugs to Tapah prison in Perak. It led to the prisons department installing anti-drone systems and locally developed interception equipment at all prisons.
In 2020, two Singaporean men were arrested by the Singapore police for using a drone to smuggle drugs into the republic from Malaysia. Flight data retrieved showed that the drone had been flown from Kranji to Johor Bahru and back again to Kranji.
