Expert: PP TUNAS penalties push electronic system operators towards child-friendly tech innovation
Jakarta (ANTARA) - Cybersecurity expert Pratama Persadha has assessed that penalties related to PP TUNAS compliance, which may be imposed on local Electronic System Operators (PSE), could actually spur the creation of technology innovations designed to be child-friendly from the outset.
According to Pratama, fines for local PSE over PP TUNAS compliance will not create fear among operators seeking to innovate, but will instead drive the creation of features, products or services by the nation’s own developers that prioritise child safety in the digital space.
“Regulation should not be seen as an obstacle to innovation. Regulation can in fact serve as a mechanism to raise the quality of innovation. Digital products designed to be safe for children from the start will enjoy a higher level of trust from parents and society,” the lecturer at the State Intelligence College told ANTARA on Tuesday.
Pratama said that as long as the regulation is enforced proportionally, local PSE developing digital platforms in line with child safety aspects should have no reason to feel afraid.
The regulation only becomes a problem when the innovations developed by a PSE were never designed with child safety in the digital space in mind from the beginning.
Therefore, for innovation development to avoid facing the threat of fines, domestic developers need the awareness to design innovations based on the principles of security by design and child safety by design.
“When an application, game, communication platform or digital service is being designed, aspects such as user age, interaction design, collection of children’s data, recommendation algorithms, moderation systems and reporting mechanisms should all be factored in from the start,” Pratama said.
Pratama further said that beyond emphasising the responsibility of PSE, digital literacy activities for relevant parties must not be neglected in order to create more effective child protection in the digital space.
The government, he said, bears the responsibility for strengthening that comprehensive protection ecosystem.
“Digital literacy for parents and children must be strengthened, because however sophisticated protection technology is, it still has limitations when users do not understand the risks,” Pratama said.
In addition to digital literacy, the government could in future be firmer in supervising PSE on a risk-assessment basis.
Platforms with greater potential risk to children, according to Pratama, should be subject to higher security obligations and audits compared with services carrying low risk.
“An approach like this will make regulation more adaptive to technological developments,” Pratama said.
Previously, on Monday (14/9), the Ministry of Communication and Digital (Kemkomdigi) announced the value of fines for PSE violating the provisions of PP TUNAS.
Minister of Communication and Digital Meutya Hafid said the fine formulation complements the enforcement instruments for compliance with the regulation protecting children in the digital space.
For global and large-scale PSE, Meutya said the fines imposed could reach six per cent of global revenue.
Meanwhile, for domestic private PSE, the maximum fine is adjusted according to business scale. The details are a maximum fine of Rp1 billion for micro enterprises, Rp5 billion for small enterprises, and Rp10 billion for medium-sized enterprises.