Terms & Conditions

Copyright

All editorial content, texts, photographs, images, illustrations, designs, graphics, video and soundbites, “look and feel”, metadata, data, compilations (hereinafter referred to as “Content”) on The Star Online, The Star Mobile Application and other subsites (hereinafter collectively referred to as “Sites”) under Star Media Group Berhad (Company No.: 197101000523 (10894-D)) (hereinafter referred to as “The Company”) are owned or controlled by The Company or the party credited as the provider of the Content. The Content is also protected by Malaysian copyright law and international treaties and may not be copied or re-used without the express permission of The Company, which reserves all rights. The Company also owns copyright in the selection, coordination, compilation and enhancement of such Content. Re-use of any of such content online for any purpose is strictly prohibited. Permission to use The Company's proprietary content may be granted on a case-by-case basis. Please direct your enquiries to feedback@thestar.com.my.

The materials from the Sites are intended and available for your personal use and for informational and non-commercial offline use only, provided that: the Content are not modified, amended or altered in any way whatsoever; all copyright and other notices on any copy are retained; and permission in writing has been granted by The Company. You may not reproduce, upload, display or distribute the Content from the Sites whether for commercial or personal purposes without the express written permission of The Company.

You may not copy or adapt the HTML code that The Company creates to display pages. It also is covered by The Company's copyright. The "look" and "feel" of the Sites are also trademarks of The Company. This includes but not limited to colour scheme, button shapes, layout, and all other graphical elements.

Third party news agency material contained in the Sites is protected by copyright and shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium. Neither this material nor any portion thereof may be stored in a computer except for personal and non-commercial use.

Non-commercial use does not include the use of Content without prior written consent from The Company in connection with (i) the development of any software program, model, algorithm, or other generative artificial intelligence (hereinafter referred as “AI”) Tool, including but not limited to, training or using the Content in connection with the development of or operation of a machine learning or AI system including using any of the Content for training, fine tuning, or grounding the machine to learn or AI system or as part of retrieval-augmented generation; or (ii) providing archived or cached data containing the Content to any other person or entity.

The Company and/or news agency/agencies, as the case maybe, will not be held liable for any delays, inaccuracies, errors or omissions therefrom or in the transmission or delivery of all or any part thereof or for any damages arising from any of the foregoing.

The Company and its subsidiaries

The Company and its group of companies operate in Malaysia. Publications produced include newspaper titles: The Star newspaper, Majoriti 7, StarBiz 7, After Work and Suria 7.

The Company, through its subsidiaries, also provides content and advertising services on digital portals, which shall include but not limited to:

Thestar.com.my, The Star mobile application, The Star ePaper, StarMediaGroup.my, TheStarTV.com., mStar, mStar mobile application, majoriti.com.my, R.AGE, 988.com.my, shopnow.988.com.my, 988 FM mobile application, Suria.my, Suria Malaysia mobile application, StarProperty, Carsifu.my, Kuali, Kuali mobile application, myStarjob.com, StarCherish.com, PerfectLivin.com; events services, Star Education Fair, myStarJob Fair, Star Health Expo, Star Outstanding Business Awards, Export Excellence Awards, ESG Positive Impact Awards, Women’s Fiesta, StarWalk, Anak-Anak Malaysia Walk, Ride for Malaysia, Perfect Livin, Perfect Lifestyle, Star Supa Comic, StarProperty Fair, StarProperty Awards, StarLIVE, Star Golden Hearts Award, and Star Sterling Service Award, starbiz7.com.my, starsearch.thestar.com.my, malaysiadeveloperawards.com.my, sgha.com.my, newsstand.thestar.com.my, starfoundation.com.my, smgland.com.my, majoriti7.com.my and smg360.com.my.

In addition, The Company either through itself or through its subsidiary owns and/or operates the following radio channels, namely (988 and Suria).

You can get a quick overview of the group structure.

Trademarks

Among the trademarks and service marks owned by The Company and/or its subsidiaries which shall include but not limited to : The Star Online, Star Media Group, TheStarTV.com, mStar, majoriti, R.AGE, 988, Suria, SMEBiz, StarProperty, CarSifu, Kuali, myStarjob.com, Star Newspaper-in-Education (NiE), Step Up, Kuntum, Star Outstanding Business Awards (SOBA), Export Excellence Awards, Star Golden Hearts Award, StarWalk, Perfect Livin, Ride for Malaysia, Stand Together, Women do Wonders (WOW), ESG and the respective logos of all the sites. All other trademarks and trade names are the property of their respective owners.

House Rules

The Company has a thriving user community and actively encourages commenting on articles and stories. We are dedicated to this community and strive to maintain a respectful, engaging and informative conversation. Towards that end, we have general guidelines for commenting. They are enforced 24/7 by a moderating system that features a team of staff and moderation tools. If in our absolute opinion, your comments consistently or intentionally make this community a less civil and enjoyable place to be, you and your comments will be excluded from it.

The Company promotes a receptive, transparent and civil atmosphere for comments and users. Critical, in-depth and intelligent discussions and debates are encouraged.

A. The Dont's. Everyone is welcomed and encouraged to voice their opinion regardless of identity, politics, ideology, religion or agreement with other community members, the author of the post or members as long as those opinions are respectful and constructively add to the conversation. However, this community does not tolerate direct or indirect attacks, name-calling or insults, nor does it tolerate intentional attempts to derail, hijack, troll or bait others into an emotional response. We reserve absolute discretion to remove these types of comments from the community where warranted. Individuals who consistently or intentionally post these types of comments may be warned online and, if necessary, excluded from the community and/or be reported to the relevant authorities. We have established the following House Rules so that everyone can get the most out of the Sites. Please note that these rules also apply to rich media submissions such as images, video and audio clips, as well as content associated with you such as avatar images. Examples of comments that are not permitted under our House Rules include, but shall not be limited to:

• Vulgar/offensive/obscene in nature;
• Fraudulent, deceptive or misleading;
• Off topic;
• Spam (such as the same comment posted repeatedly) or include certain links to other sites;
• Impliedly or expressly attacks and/or defames any third party;
• Offensive towards any gender, ethnic, religion, race, royalty or culture;
• Advocating any illegal activity;
• Describe or encourage activities which could endanger the safety or well-being of others;
• Promoting particular services, products, or political organisations;
• Appear to impersonate someone else;
• Contains disclosure of personal information including name, contact number, address, email and others;
• Infringing the proprietary rights, copyrights or trademarks of any party;
• Illegal and/or breaches any regulations or laws currently in force;
• Are written in anything other than English, Bahasa Malaysia unless expressly stated;
• Any other comments that the Team deems inappropriate;
• Advertising or promoting products or websites is strictly prohibited . This may include links to:
• Personal websites or forums;
• Surveys and questionnaires;
• Commercial websites or auction sites that mainly exist to sell products.
• Details of charity or fundraising events
  

  For example, if it's relevant to the debate, it is fine to link to a website that sells an album or book if it helps another user or recommends something they would like. However, posting up links to your own band's album or trying to drive buyers to your e-bay auction or fundraising site may result in your post being removed.

• Risk breaching copyright law
  

  Copyright law exists to stop someone from plagiarising another's work. It applies to the internet in the same way as it does to TV, books and the press. Breaking copyright law can result in being taken to court. Please do not post large chunks of text copied from other sources, as this may be an infringement of copyright. Short quotes to illustrate a point may be permissible, although this is at our discretion.

  If you wish to refer to external sources of information, it's better to include a link to an appropriate external website.

  In addition to this, postings with heavy text speak or unintelligible language such as codes, are also not allowed as this may disrupt the natural flow of conversation.

  Contributing material to any of the Sites’ community with the intention to commit a crime, break the law, or condone or encourage unlawful activity is strictly prohibited.

  In addition, we may remove posts which we consider could endanger other users - which shall include but not limited to, offering medical and health advice, or encouraging drug or alcohol abuse or self-harm.

• Contain potentially defamatory statements
  

  Defamation laws exist to protect individuals and/or organisations from unwarranted, mistaken, or untruthful attacks on their reputation. Posting a defamatory statement on our Sites is the same as publishing it in a newspaper or magazine and can result in legal proceedings being commenced.

  To avoid legal proceedings being commenced, please ensure that you verify the information in your posting as true and accurate, especially when presenting negative statements as facts. Also, avoid jumping to conclusions, exaggerating or making subtle implications. Remember that adding the word 'allegedly' to a statement does not stop it being defamatory. Both you and The Company can be held liable if you make a defamatory statement on the Sites. So we will remove comments where we have insufficient evidence to defend publication of your statement. This means the Sites moderators may err on the side of caution when considering some comments.

• Are abusive or disruptive
  

  Abusive or disruptive behaviour is not allowed on the Sites. This includes, but shall not be limited to:

  • Using swear words (including abbreviations or alternative spellings) or other language likely to offend.
  • Harassing, threatening, or causing distress or inconvenience to any person or people.
  • Flaming: This means posting something that's angry and mean-spirited.
  • Trolling: This means saying deliberately provocative things just to stir up trouble.
  • Infringing the rights of, restrict or inhibit anyone else's use and enjoyment of the Sites.
  • Attempting to impersonate somebody.
  • Using multiple accounts to disrupt boards, annoy users, or to avoid pre-moderation.
  • Bumping or creating duplicate threads, posting in such a way as to cause technical errors, or any other attempts to disrupt the normal flow of conversation. Users who seriously or repeatedly demonstrate such behaviour may have their accounts pre-moderated or permanently restricted and will not be allowed to return.
• Are offensive
  

  Comments that contain offensive content are not allowed on the Sites. Racist, sexist, homophobic, disabling, sexually explicit, abusive, against any religion or royalty, or otherwise objectionable material will be removed and if extreme will result in immediate and permanent restriction of your account.

• Are off-topic
  

  Comments that are unrelated to the subject of the article entry to which you are contributing are considered 'off-topic'.

  Please do not contribute off-topic material in subject-specific article, except where an article has designated open post. If your comment has been removed for being off-topic, you may be able to resubmit your comment in a more relevant topic area.

• Contain personal details
  

  Including contact or identification details in comments such as phone numbers, postal or email addresses is not allowed on most services. Please do not reveal any personal information about yourself or others as it might inadvertently put you or someone else at risk.

• Risk contempt of court
  

  Once a suspect is arrested for an offence, or offences, legal restrictions apply. Please use caution when discussing reports of an arrest or court proceedings. Even linking to archived news stories, blog entries, and comments may be unlawful as Malaysian contempt law, would usually prohibit any reference to the previous conviction(s) of someone facing new court proceedings.

• Contain spam
  

  Spamming or flooding is not allowed on the Sites. Spamming means submitting the same or very similar contribution many times across blogs or entries. Flooding comprises a resubmission of your contribution to the same site multiple times.

  Please do not use a signature beneath your comment to promote websites, services, products, or campaigns. This will cause your posts to be removed as spam.

• Contain unsuitable URLs
  

  For example you should not link to

  • Unlawful, unsuitable or sexually explicit content.
  • Websites that require payment to access.
  • Foreign language content.
  • Websites that initiate a file download or require additional software in order to view them. This includes .pdf and .mp3 files.
• Websites that advertise or promote products
  

  In some cases the moderator will edit out the link/s leaving the rest of the comment visible on the board. If so the link will be replaced by [Unsuitable/ broken URL removed by moderator].

  The Company welcomes feedback, both positive and negative, about our programmes and services but please make sure your comments are in line with the above House Rules.

  Repeatedly posting personal or offensive comments about individual members of the public or people who work for the Company and its group of subsidiaries and/or companies may be considered harassment. We reserve the right to remove such messages and take action against those responsible.

B. Moderation Process. To maintain a civil atmosphere, our moderation team may read comments before they are displayed to other users. If this is the case, you may see your comment pending approval. Approval times can vary depending on the site-wide comment load, so please be patient; we will get to all comments as quickly as possible.

C. The Do's. Be yourself, only yourself, and just one of yourself. Every person's opinion is valuable and unique. Pretending to be someone else removes that unique value from you or from others. Don't misrepresent yourself or others, spread misinformation, create multiple accounts or "astroturf" (Where a user pretends to be an objective commentator, but has a vested interest in the subject matter) If you do, you will make the community a less enjoyable and valuable place to be and will be removed when we see it.

This community is a safe space. We strongly believe that the Sites’ should be a safe space for individuals, groups and their ideas. As such, violent and hostile language or calls for violence and hostility are not welcome here. If you directly or indirectly threaten the physical or mental wellbeing of a member of this community, or an individual or group who is the subject of an article, you will be removed immediately. If a credible threat is made against an individual or group, not only will it be removed but it is likely that it will be reported to law enforcement agencies and we will cooperate with them to any extent requested. Personal identifiable information should never be posted. It never turns out well for anyone. If you see any threats, harassment or personal information trolling please report it quickly.

If you have comments, we are here and we have real people who read and reply.

If you have complaints, questions, concerns, or just feedback - positive or critical - please get in touch with us here

Disclaimers and Warnings

A. Disclaimer Option.
(i) The Company seeks to ensure that information contained in these pages is accurate. However, The Company makes no representations as to accuracy, correctness, completeness, suitability, validity of any information on these pages and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, delay in the information contained in this pages or any other information accessed via any of the Sites, including without limitation, any information reached via links on the Sites to external sites, or any losses, injuries or damages arising from its display or use. All users are strongly encouraged to seek professional advice before relying on any information provided herein.
(ii) The Company shall not be liable in anyway whatsoever for any and all losses or damages which you may suffer including but not limited to any financial and/or information loss.

B. Warning Option.
(i) To avoid disappointment, we encourage you to consult our Terms and Conditions and House Rules before commenting. Please be aware that your comment is subject to these rules as well as our Terms & Conditions and may be removed without prior notice should it violate either of the aforementioned.
(ii) You shall download The Star Mobile Application from either Google Play Store or the Apple App Store. You shall not download The Star Mobile Application from any other sources.
(iii) You shall not use The Star Mobile Application on any illegally modified devices such as jailbroken device, rooted device or any device that has been altered in any way whatsoever.
(iv) You shall be fully responsible for any losses or damages that you may suffer in anyway whatsoever should you breach any of the terms herein.

Assignment

You shall not assign or in any other way transfer your rights or obligations under these Terms and Conditions or part thereof. We may assign these Terms and Conditions whether in whole or in part to any third party without prior notice.

Waiver

No failure or delay in exercising any of our rights under these Terms and Condition will operate as a waiver of such right unless otherwise acknowledged and agreed by us in writing.

Governing Law

These Terms and Conditions shall be construed in accordance with and governed by the law of Malaysia and you hereby agree to submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Malaysian courts.

PRIVACY of Personal Information

Please refer to the privacy policy (https://www.thestar.com.my/privacy/) to view the terms regarding the use of your information.

Contact Us

If there are any questions or concerns regarding this Terms and Conditions or the consent practices outlined herein, please contact us as follows: