The Indonesian government has ordered 18,232 Private Electronic System (PSE) providers to sign an integrity pact to combat online gambling. These include major firms such as Google, Meta, TikTok, and X.
Budi Arie Setiadi, Communication and Informatics Minister said last Tuesday that private PSEs must immediately comply with the integrity pact. Non-compliance will result in the removal of their resignation.
PSEs or digital companies are necessary to secure electronic information on their platforms. This is according to Government Regulation No. 71 of 2019, as well as Ministerial Regulation No. 5 of 2020. Administrative sanctions including access blocking may result from non-compliance.
The list of Private Electronic System (PSE) providers includes 17,362 local entities and 870 foreign ones. Key local PSEs include Gojek, Tokopedia, Ovo, Traveloka, Bukalapak, PLN, and Indihome. On the other hand, the global ones include Google, Facebook, WhatsApp, TikTok, Linktree, and Spotify.
By the government’s Online Gambling Task Force, it is ramping up efforts against online gambling. This is with previous measures freezing 32 gambling sites, as well as auditing 21 payment service providers.
The Financial Intelligence Unit (PPATK) estimates that online gambling has cost Indonesians Rp 327 trillion over the past year. Losses in this year surpassed Rp 100 trillion. Estimated 2.1 million are youths and working-age individuals out of 2.37 million online gamblers. The Communications Ministry has removed about 2.95 million gambling-related content pieces since July of last year.
