THIS Malaysian actress got hot under the collar when saucy, intimate pictures of her were leaked onto the Internet.

Dubbed by Guang Ming Daily as Malaysia's version of the Edison Chen sex scandal, private photos of TV actress Zarina Ann Julie were found online.

The actress is famous for her role in the series Anak Pontianak.

There were pictures of her appearing topless and posing intimately with a man.

Others depict her sticking her tongue out saucily at the camera, or dressing sexily.

While the photographs might not have been as revealing as the Hong Kong scandal, the incident has drawn fierce criticism in a largely conservative film industry.

Guang Ming Daily reported that the actress, who's in her early 20s, had initially denied she and her boyfriend were the ones in the photographs .

Then, she insisted that the photographs had been doctored.

But as more photos made their way online, some of which showed the birthmark near her right shoulder, she finally admitted that the photos are real.

Zarina said that the photographs were taken when she was 18 years old, before she became famous.

She said: 'I know who is responsible for leaking these photographs but I don't know what their motivations are.'

However, Zarina did not reveal who this person was.

She told the newspaper that nobody was perfect and she apologised to her fans asking them for their forgiveness .

The actress of Iranian and Malay heritage said: 'Now that the harm has been done, I will explain to my parents.'

However, the actress added that she didn't understand why the matter had become a hot topic of discussion.

Netizens disagreed.

Behave

Anak Sarawak wrote: 'I don't mean to slam the young actors nowadays but it seems a lot of them do not know how to behave themselves.

'They are in the public eye, they should know better than do lewd acts like this.'

Another alleged that there was a video of the actress to come.

Said annajulie: ' She's lucky her video wasnt leaked... yes...there's a video but it's an old one.

'If it's leaked, then she'll bec(ome) the Paris Hilton of M'sia 'One night in Msia'.'

Zarina got her first breakthrough role starring in Anak Pontianak, a television version of the movie which starred popular actress, Maya Karin.

She was said to have been selected for the role because of her resemblance to the German-Indonesian beauty.

This article was first published in The New Paper on Sep 11, 2008.