A Malaysian student whose mobile was stolen while he was sleeping has tracked down the culprit – a monkey who took photo and video selfies with the device before abandoning it.

Zackrydz Rodzi said that his phone was missing from his bedroom when he woke up on Saturday and while he found the phone’s casing under his bed, there was no sign of robbery in his house in southern Johor state.

When his father saw a monkey the next day, he launched a search in the jungle behind his house and using his brother’s phone to call the device, he found it covered in mud under a palm tree.

But a bigger surprise came when he checked his phone and found a series of monkey selfies and videos recorded.

Monkey
The phone was found outside with selfies on it (Zackrydz Rodzi via AP Photo)

“My uncle was joking that maybe the monkey took some selfies with the phone… So when I checked my phone picture gallery, I was shocked. The suspect’s face was plastered on the screen. It was hilarious,” said Zackrydz.

The 20-year-old said he was curious as to why the monkey took the phone and not the camera or other things in his room and thought the primate must have thought it was food as it has a colourful casing.

Most of the images were blurry but some showed the monkey’s face and one of the videos taken from atop a tree showed glimpses of the monkey opening his mouth and appearing to try to eat the phone.

“My house is now in a total lockdown,” Zackrydz said, laughing, adding that he did not want a repeat of the incident.