Results: Approximately 5 percents of Thai and Malaysian adolescents were current smokers, with an additional 9.6 percents of Thai and 7.8 percents of Malaysian adolescents reported being a beginner smoker. On average, Thai smoker reported to have first smoked a whole cigarette at 14.6 years of age (SD=1.93), while Malaysian smoker at age 13.9 (SD=2.16). About half of Thai smoker (56.9%) reported that they bought cigarettes for them-selves and 31.5 percents got cigarettes from friends. In Malaysia, most of smoker (71.4%) reported that they bought cigarettes for themselves, only 19.8 percents got cigarettes from friends. Sixty seven percents of Thai adolescent smokers smoked factory-made cigarettes as their usual brand compare to 29.9 percents of Malaysian adolescent smokers (p<0.01). Eight percents of Thai adolescents and 13.6 percent Malaysian adolescents reported smoking hand-rolled cigarettes. Eighty four percents of Thai and 76.1 percent of Malaysian adolescent smokers reported that they tried to quit. Conclusions: Smoking prevalence of Thai adolescents was closed to that of Malaysian adolescents. Factory-made cigarette consumption is an important problem in Thai adolescents and needs to be targeted. Objectives: To monitor tobacco industry's marketing tactics pre and post implementation of pictorial health warnings in Malaysia. Methods: An observational study was conducted to monitor new marketing strategies and changes in product and packaging designs prior and post to implementation of pictorial health warnings on cigarette packs effective 1 January 2009. A survey instrument was used to collect data in selected point-of-sales in Penang, Malaysia. All new product and pack designs of the most popular cigarette brands were purchased and scrutinized for promotional features. Observations of point-of-sales displays were also made. Data were analyzed using qualitative methods. Results: Since the banning of advertising at point-of-sales the tobacco industry invested more resources into packaging design and point-of-sale display in order to communicate brand imagery and increase sales primarily targeting children and young people. With the implementation of pictorial health warnings and ban on descriptors, the industry continues to promote its products with introduction of a variety of innovative pack and product designs. Textual descriptors such as light and mild are replaced with varied colour tones (silver and blue) to shape consumer perceptions of risk and have the misleading effect as light and mild. Colours and pack designs are also used by the industry to dilute the effects of pictorial health warnings. Conclusions: Tobacco control policies have to be water-tight to prevent the tobacco industry from exploiting the loopholes in these policies. The Malaysian government should implement plain packaging which would increase the effectiveness of health warnings, reduce misconceptions about smoking risks and prevent the use of bran variants as a promotional tool. This will help reduce smoking uptake amongst children and young people.