Malaysia bans civil servants from Waze over Israel data fears — SkimNews
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- Malaysia banned all civil servants from using Waze after PM Anwar Ibrahim said the app's Israeli origins raised data security risks
- Anwar announced the review on Oct 21 after chairing a national cybersecurity committee, warning that Waze "was bound to Israeli laws" and that the government "cannot compromise on the security of people's data and identities"
- Chief Secretary Shamsul Azri Abu Bakar formalized the prohibition in a letter dated Oct 20 to heads of government agencies, with the directive taking effect immediately
- The government recommended TuJu, a domestic mapping app developed by the Malaysian Highway Authority, as a replacement for civil servants
- Waze was founded in Israel, acquired by Alphabet-owned Google in 2013 for approximately US$1 billion, and relies on crowd-sourced data and satellite signals for real-time traffic information
- Malaysia, a Muslim-majority nation and staunch supporter of the Palestinian cause, does not maintain diplomatic relations with Israel
Why it matters: Malaysia's entire civil service — potentially millions of employees — must abandon one of the world's most widely used navigation apps and switch to a domestic alternative, showing how a geopolitical stance on Israel can override the use of an American-owned product based on its founders' nationality.
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