Johor revoked the school’s business and advertising licenses on July 21, while Srinivasan moved to pursue a five-year agreement with Kazakhstan focused on AI, start-ups and international events.
Malaysia ordered Balaji Srinivasan’s Network School to cease operations in Johor after local authorities revoked its business and advertising licenses over licensing and premises-use breaches, despite finding no evidence that participants had violated travel document rules. The shutdown on July 21 followed online allegations that Israeli nationals had joined the program using second-country passports, a sensitive issue in Malaysia, which does not recognize Israel and generally bars entry to Israeli passport holders. A day later, Srinivasan said he had signed a five-year memorandum of understanding with Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Development to develop a new campus centered on AI, research, start-ups, hackathons and potentially a Network State conference this year. The episode has become a broader flashpoint around Srinivasan’s “network state” vision, Malaysia’s pro-Palestinian politics, and the use of Forest City, the troubled Malaysia megaproject backed by Country Garden, as a base for crypto-friendly and tech-utopian communities.