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Reported leak adds urgency for speedy passage of data protection bill: House speaker
Following the alleged breach of eHAC data, House of Representatives Speaker Puan Maharani has urged that the personal data protection bill be ratified as soon as possible.
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Indonesia has yet to join the club of nations from Brazil to China and India that have issued stringent regulations on personal data protection, modeled on the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which protects citizens from privacy and data breaches regardless of where the data is processed. (Shutterstock/PopTika)
T
he reported data leak from the now-defunct Health Alert Card (eHAC) system has highlighted the need for speedy deliberation on the personal data protection bill, House of Representatives Speaker Puan Maharani said on Wednesday.
Puan issued the statement amid the government’s ongoing investigation into the suspected data hack of the old eHAC system, which had compromised the contact details, ID card information and COVID-19 test results of around 1.3 million Indonesians. The Health Ministry used the system for COVID-19 contact tracing efforts.
The government assured the public that the new eHAC system, connected to the PeduliLindungi app, was safe, saying that the system’s server infrastructure was located in the national data center secured by the National Cyber and Encryption Agency (BSSN).
Read also: Cyber-attack haunts Indonesia's COVID-19 strategy
Following the incident, Puan reaffirmed the House’s commitment to completing the ongoing deliberation process of the data protection bill, adding that she hoped the government would also show its “seriousness” in the deliberation process so that the bill can be signed in the House’s current session.
The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) politician also called on the government to optimize its data-management system to prevent similar incidents from happening in the future, considering the government’s increasing reliance on digital systems for its pandemic-handling policies.
"The management of people's data should not be played with. The protection of citizens' personal data must be carried out optimally so that there is no leakage,” Puan said in the statement.
