The video, which shows a young girl scooping the dogs out of a bucket and hurling them into the water to drown, spread across the internet this week (beg30Aug10) and sparked outrage.

Little is known about the nameless young woman in the video, and Hollywood director Bay is offering a huge sum of money to assist officials in tracking her down.

A post on Bay's official website reads, "There is a disturbing video going around the news outlets. It's a video of a blonde young woman in a red sweatshirt casually tossing squealing puppies into the fast-moving river one by one.

"Michael Bay has informed me that he is offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and successful prosecution of the woman in the red sweatshirt and the person who shot this act of cruelty."

An apology purportedly from the girl in the video was posted on YouTube.com on Wednesday (01Sep10).