After a brief hiatus, tontos or 'spies' hired by pirated VCD peddlers, are back in Penang trailing each and every move of anti-piracy enforcement officers.

The tontos, numbering about 30, are often spotted on stakeout near the state Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Department office at Bangunan Tunku Syed Putra along Downing Street in George Town and the homes of several senior enforcement officers like director Fahmi Kasim and operations chief Norashikin Abdul Hamid almost everyday.

They are virtually on a round-the-clock stakeout to carry out surveillance and report every movement of the officers to traders.

Equipped with a cellular phone and a motorcycle each, tontos are hired by pirated VCD distributors to monitor and instantly report the department's operations.

Each tonto is said to be handsomely rewarded by their 'bosses' with petrol allowance, a mobile phone and RM50 daily for their hard work.

Their presence has become a nuisance to the department for the past five years that many of anti-piracy raids had been futile.

Because of the effectiveness of the tontos, enforcement officers have to constantly re-strategise their modus operandi to beat them but they had limited success.

Finally patience ran out and the department sought help from the police to nab these tontos.

Many tontos were detained, remanded and charged with disrupting enforcement officers from carrying out their task to flush out illegal DVDs, VCDs, musical CDs and MP3 play stations from the streets.

In retaliation, certain VCD peddlers sent threatening cellular messages to enforcement officers.

RM2m worth of items seized

According to Fahmi, the department's cohesive action to take on the tontos paid off as between late last year and early this year, they were almost wiped out.

As a result, the department was able to carry out many successful raids to flush out illegal VCD peddlers on the streets, estimated to be some 200 about a year ago.

After the street traders, the department then turned its attention to flushing out those operating in shops.

Fahmi revealed that between January and April this year, the department seized nearly RM2 million worth of pirated DVDs, VCDs, CDs, MP3 play stations, software, DVD/VCD players, computer sets and other appliances in 278 cases.

However, the department's efforts to achieve its goal was thwarted by the return of rejuvenated tontos over the past two months.

"They seem to be everywhere we go. At our office, homes and even when we were having our meals," said Fahmi.

With tontos back on the streets, the department's job gets tougher. But the Penang enforcement director is determined to achieve his goal of wiping out the menace.

"We will seek police help again, if necessary, to clamp down on them. We will intensify our enforcement as we aim to attain our goal of wiping out pirated items from Penang," Fahmi stressed.

Athi Veeranggan is malaysiakini's Penang-based stringer.