[1] The act defines an "official secret" as: ...any document specified in the Schedule and any information and material relating thereto and includes any other official document, information and material as may be classified as 'Top Secret', 'Secret', 'Confidential' or 'Restricted', as the case may be, by a Minister, the Menteri Besar or Chief Minister of a State or such public officerThe Schedule to the Act covers "Cabinet documents, records of decisions and deliberations including those of Cabinet committees", as well as similar documents for state executive councils.

The act has been criticised for ostensibly stifling dissent and reducing transparency in government workings.

One statesman has suggested that the act has turned the press into "an alternative Government Gazette".

In addition, the usage of the act to classify documents which "cannot by any stretch of the imagination be reasonably confidential or secret" has been criticised.

[1] The Official Secrets Act 1972, in its current form (1 January 2006), consists of 31 sections and 1 schedule (including 9 amendments), without separate Part.