Tangerang tells net cafes to install anti-porn software

TANGERANG: Tangerang Municipality announced on Sunday a plan to ban porn sites at Internet cafes in the city during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

"This ban is aimed at reducing negative effects from Internet misuse among students," the city's information and communi-cations agency head Saeful Rochman told tempointeraktif.com on Sunday.

Saeful said the municipality planned to include the policy in a bylaw on telecommunications business services.

Under the policy, the owners of Internet cafes are required to install an application on their computers that blocks porn sites.

The announcement was distributed to 323 Internet cafes registered by the agency.

The policy follows on from a porn site blocking program pioneered by the Communications and Information Technology Ministry earlier this year.

Violators could face up to six years in prison and a maximum fine of Rp 1 billion (US$112,000). - JP