Court reviews electronic transaction law

JAKARTA: The Constitutional Court held the first hearing of a judicial review of the 2008 Information and Electronic Transaction (ITE) Law on Tuesday.

Petitioners filed a request for a judicial review into a contentious article of the law in January. They said article 31 (4) of the law, which mandates lawful interception by law enforcement institutions and would be further regulated by government regulation, was a violation to their constitutional rights as advocates.

"If requests for interceptions are controlled by a government regulation, we are afraid that our clients will have limited complaint mechanisms *if they feel the interceptions are against their rights*," Wahyu Wagiman, a lawyer for the plaintiffs said.

Plaintiffs Anggara, the director of the Institute Criminal Justice Reform; Supriyadi Widodo Eddyono, the coordinator of the Indonesia Media Defense Litigation Network; and Wahyudi Djafar, a researcher from the Center for Democracy and Human Rights Studies, said they had received many complaints from their clients on the inappropriate implementation of the law.

"We believe the article on interception violates our constitutio-nal rights to maintain confiden-tiality with our clients," Anggara said. - JP