Cyber crime trial goes nowhere but on debate
Cyber crime trial goes nowhere but on debate
Urip Hudiono, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
There was a defendant, a panel of judges and prosecutors inside a
court room at the Central Jakarta District Court on Tuesday.
The third session of the trial of Dani Firmansyah, the alleged
hacker of the General Elections Commission (KPU) website, was
already underway, but the court was still debating the virtual
"attack".
"Had it (the attack) actually caused a physical disturbance or
an electromagnetic disturbance?" Dani's lawyer Mukhtar Zuhdy
asked KPU information technology (IT) team head Achyar Oemry,
referring to the exact wording of Law No. 36/1999 on
telecommunications.
Witness Achyar merely replied that "the display of KPU's
website had been altered", although he did not know if such an
event could be defined as a "physical or electromagnetic
disturbance".
He added that the break-in on April 17 had caused the website
to go off-line for some three hours and had ruined the public's
trust in KPU's IT system, which is worth some Rp 152 billion
(US$16.38 million).
Prosecutor Ramos Horta tried to pinpoint the "illegal access"
aspect of the break-in, as Achyar said there were only six people
who had the right to access the KPU's website, including altering
its contents.
Presiding judge Hamdi intervened in the debate and told the
trial that they would have to wait for testimonies from expert
witnesses to define what was exactly meant by "disturbance".
With the absence of a cyber law, Dani has been charged under
Article 22 of the Telecommunication Law for illegally accessing a
telecommunication network and/or service, and Article 38 of the
law for causing physical or electromagnetic disturbance to a
telecommunication service.
Dani could face a maximum sentence of six years in prison
and/or a fine of Rp 600 million as stipulated in the law's
Articles 50 and 58 respectively if found guilty of committing
either crime.
In the last session on Aug. 31, the defense team had
questioned witness Comr. Petrus Napitu, an officer of the Jakarta
Police cyber crime unit who was on duty monitoring KPU's display
of the legislative election tally count, when he said that an
"attack" had likely occurred on KPU's website.
The defense team questioned the word "attack", as there was no
physical evidence that such an attack had taken place.
They also questioned the electronic evidence presented by the
cyber crime unit chief Sr. Comr. Petrus Golose, as Article 184 of
the Criminal Code Procedures stipulates that legal evidence shall
only include testimonies from witnesses, experts and defendants,
as well as documents.
Other witnesses in Tuesday's session were two other officers
from the cyber crime unit, Second Insp. Sugeng Priyadi and Comr.
Parmin. They testified as to how they had managed to trace Dani
and eventually apprehended him at his office at PT Danareksa.
The trial was adjourned until Sept. 14 to hear more
testimonies from witnesses.