Internet savvy keeps cyber crime away

Although Indonesia now has more equipment to protect itself against many kinds of cyber crime, experts believe arming oneself with proper knowledge about the Internet is the best defense.

Information and technology expert Onno W. Purbo said that apart from the cyber law, Indonesia also had supervisory bodies, yet their limited personnel could not be effective to protect individuals from cyber attacks.

"We have ID-SIRTII and cyber crime units at the police, but as millions of attacks occur every day, it would be more effective if people understood about using the internet in healthy ways, so they can deflect attacks themselves," he said.

"Let the police and ID-SIRTII take care of strategic cases that could threaten the country."

The Indonesia Security Incident Response Team of Internet Infrastructure (ID-SIRTII) is an institution whose tasks are, among others, to assist and increase security system in the country's strategic institutions and to provide an early warning on threats towards the telecommunication network.

Head of the cyber crime unit Adj. Sr. Comr. Winston Tommy Watuliu at the Jakarta Police said that it would be too difficult for the police to comprehensively tackle cyber crime.

"It's like placing one security guard at every house in the country. Impossible."

Internet users who like to shop online, for instance, he said, should take precautions.

"When you find something interesting on an online store, don't click the buy button right away. It's better if you first check that it exists."

Wilson said the most common crimes in the virtual world were credit card fraud and internet hacking.

"The more sophisticated the digital world is, the higher the possibility that people will use it for criminal actions."

According to The European Council Convention on Cyber Crime, cyber crime is defined as offenses against the confidentiality, integrity and availability of computer data and systems that cover illegal access, illegal interception, data interference, system interference and misuse of devices. Hacking is included in this category.

Apart from credit card fraud, Indonesia has also seen many criminal actions via the internet. During the election periods, many hackers launched attacks to disrupt the counting process. Also, cases involving social networking site, Facebook, through which people are trying to net their possible victims for fraud.

Criminologist from the University of Indonesia, Adrianus Meliala, said that almost all kinds of cyber crimes took place in Indonesia.

"There has to be some kind of supervision so that it won't cause any damage to the country."

Adrianus added that strong measures, such as criminal sanction in a law, must be included so that the regulation would be effective. In 2008, the House of Representatives passed the Electronic Information and Transaction Law, which prohibits citizens from distributing slander in any electronic format. Perpetrators can get a maximum of six years in prison or a fine of Rp 1 billion (US$107,526).

However, Onno said it would need more detailed measures of implementation to make it more significant.

"Actually, there's this unwritten law on the internet. Many internet users call it *netiquette', and I think it's more effective than the law made by the government."

For tips on healthy Internet usage, click on www.internetsehat.org