KUALA LUMPUR – US investor Balaji Srinivasan said an immigration check at a “digital nomad” community in Malaysia based on anonymous social media claims of law violations that proved unfounded could be a risk to Malaysia’s plans to be a global tech hub.

On July 15, the Immigration Department said its inspections had found that members of the Network School in Johor’s Forest City had valid travel documents, a day after the authorities announced a probe into online claims that Israelis were among them in violation of local laws.

“Should the global tech community continue investing in Malaysia?” Srinivasan, a former Coinbase chief technology officer who founded the Network School, said in a social media post late on July 16.

He said his experience would be of interest to “executives at Google, Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft, founders of tech unicorns like Coinbase and Solana, and investors at the world’s largest venture capital funds”.

Srinivasan said his further planned investments in the country were on hold until he received assurances the episode would not be repeated, and asked for a meeting with the prime minister’s office.

Reuters has sought comment from the prime minister’s office on Srinivasan’s post.

Srinivasan said false claims of harbouring illegal aliens made by an anonymous social media account sparked a visit days later by the authorities, who he said checked hundreds of passports of people, including dual passport holders, and found all were in order.

The Immigration Department said on July 15 that its inspection of 266 foreigners