Eradicating Online Gambling, Kominfo Will Coordinate With Telecommunications Services

The Ministry of Communication and Informatics press conference (photo: Dinda Buana/VOI)

JAKARTA - Indonesia is one of the countries in ASEAN that prohibits online gambling. Therefore, the Government seeks to eradicate online gambling sites, including taking firm action against influencers who promote or facilitate online gambling content.

"In addition to influencers, the mode of spreading online gambling content that has been rife lately is also through SMS-blast and WA-blast," said Minister of Communication and Information Budi Arie Setiadi on Thursday, July 29.

Furthermore, to ensure that the distribution of online gambling content does not increase, the Ministry of Communication and Informatics will cooperate and coordinate with cellular telecommunications service providers.

"We will coordinate with cellular operators how they have a system or mechanism so that the WA blast and SMS blast are not used for online gambling things," he said.

Finally, the Minister of Communication and Information Budi also encouraged the public to report if they found online gambling content. According to him, the Ministry of Communication and Informatics is ready to serve every public report related to online gambling.

"We also ask for public participation in providing information and complaints if we execute the sites containing elements of gambling immediately. There is no need to doubt the commitment, it's just an execution," he said.

The Director General of Informatics Applications at the Ministry of Communication and Informatics, Semuel A. Pangerapan stated that the government would handle public reports about the content, for a maximum of 1x24 hours.

Kominfo also stated that it had collaborated with the National Cyber and Crypto Agency (BSSN) to ensure that government sites were not vulnerable to infiltration. "There will be provisions. Before the government sites are uploaded or published, they must first pass the test from BSSN," he said.