GEORGE TOWN, Malaysia - Luck has run out on a 33-year-old man who used his New Zealand "connection" to rake in an average NZ$6,000 (RM14,160) monthly income through online sales of pirated DVD.

His nine-month "Kiwi operation" came to a halt when Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry enforcement personnel from Putrajaya detained him at a terrace house in Pulau Tikus here Thursday morning.

Investigations revealed that the man had charged his New Zealand clients between NZ$20 (RM47) and NZ$30 (RM70) for each pirated DVD of the latest movies, which is at least 10 times more than the RM5 for a pirated DVD sold here.

The ministry's Penang enforcement head M. Gunaselan said the man established his New Zealand contacts while studying there several years ago.

"We believe he was earning good money, generating several hundred thousand ringgit in income from sales over the past months.

"He sends out emails to his clients regularly with an attachment of at least 1,900 movie titles, including the latest movies," he said at a press conference at his office here yesterday, adding that his client base extended to Australia.

He added that the man had outsmarted the enforcement by wrapping his DVDs in aluminium foils before sending it out in parcels via courier service to avoid being detected by scanners at airports.

Gunaselan said the ministry came to know about his activities after receiving a tip-off from Motion Picture Association's (MPA) counterpart in New Zealand.

67 copies of DVDs worth RM5,000 were seized in the raid.