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Indonesia tells Google, Netflix, Twitter to register, or be banned
Civil groups call regulations authoritarian, causing public disturbance
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Applications and informatics director general Semuel Pangerapan of the Communications and Information Ministry gives a press briefing on June 27, 2022. (Kementrian Kominfo/AYH)
T
he Communications and Information Ministry has warned global tech giants to register their businesses in Indonesia by July 20, or their services will be blocked in the country.
The ministry’s applications and informatics director general, Semuel Abrijani Pangerapan, said that all private digital service providers (DSPs) like Google, Netflix, Meta and Twitter must be registered with the government’s Online Single Submission-Risk Based Approach (OSS-RBA) licensing system.
“All unregistered DSPs will be categorized as illegal, and as illegals, in accordance with [the Electronic Information and Transactions or ITE] law, they can be blocked,” Semuel told The Jakarta Post.
The ministry has set July 20 as the registration deadline for multinational DPS, a little over one month after it had announced the new regulation, sparking criticisms from civil groups.
“Why so sudden? […] We have not heard anything about this since June 2021 and it appears that there is a transparency problem here,” said Nenden Arum, head of freedom of expression at digital rights watchdog Southeast Asia Freedom of Expression Network (SAFEnet).
SAFEnet has long opposed the ITE law for potential abuse of power, and it views the DSP regulation as having the same potential. In a press release, SAFEnet highlighted that the law used the phrases “causing a public disturbance” and “public disorder” as among the conditions for taking down content or blocking access to a DSP.
“How will the government decide if something is causing a public disturbance? Do they have any objective indicator or parameter? Who has the authority to decide? The answers to these questions have never been made clear, and that is our concern,” said Nenden.
