Local police close 30 'illegal' VoIP operators

Local police close 30 'illegal' VoIP operators

Much. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Police and officials from the Ministry of Communications raided 30 allegedly illegal Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) operators on Friday -- a move that raised the hackles of industry players.

In a strong protest against the raids, the Indonesian Internet Service Providers' Association (APJII), and at least five operators, threatened lawsuits against the Jakarta Police and the ministry's Jakarta office.

Head of the Jakarta Police's special crimes division Adj. Sr. Comr. Ike Edwin claimed that the 30 VoIP operators had no licenses for their VoIP businesses, thus breaching Law No. 36/1999 on Telecommunications.

"These VoIP operators have been inflicting losses on the state of Rp 800 billion (US$86,000) per month," he told reporters.

"And some of them have been operating for the last two years ..."

APJII chairman Heru Nugroho said the association and the five VoIP operators were serious about the lawsuit threat.

He called the move "excessive and without legal basis".

"We have been informed by the government that the ban on existing operators will only start on June 1 (this year). Why did they do it now?," Heru complained.

According to Heru, the police not only closed the VoIP service of the 30 operators but also their other internet access services, thus technically blocking their customers from accessing the internet.

Heru said the 30 operators included 12 operators who had been granted licenses for "internet telephony" by the government. Reports have said that among the 12 VoIP operators were the widely known Melsanet, Primanet, Centrin, D-Net, Infoasia, Elganet, Pacific link, Central online, Bidnet and Telesindo.

VoIP is a technology that allows the transmitting of ordinary telephone calls over the Internet using packet-linked routes.

The controversy over VoIP started last year following the government's plans to allow only five operators enter the business, namely state-owned telecommunications company PT Telkom and cellular operator PT Satelindo, which is controlled by PT Indosat, another state-owned telecommunications company, and two private companies: PT Gaharu Sejahtera and PT Atlassat Solusindo.

The government issued a decree last month putting the plan into effect.

The existing operators objected to the decision, saying they already had licenses for "Internet telephony, protocol talk, protocol Internet phone, Internet talk or Internet phone". These were all other names for VoIP, Heru said.

The government however maintained that the operators had no right to enter the VoIP business as the word "VoIP" did not appear in their licenses.

The government said it would go ahead with the decree despite the strong opposition from various parties.

VoIP can slash phone bills by up to 70 percent for international calls compared to those made through Indosat.

For example, a call to Hong Kong that would cost Rp 8,000 using Indosat's international call service costs Rp 2,000 using VoIP.

This inspired Telkom and Indosat to add VoIP to their services instead of competing against it.

Telkom recently launched its VoIP service, TelkomSave, and now boasts monthly call traffic of 15 million minutes.

Telkom signed an agreement last week with an America-based VoIP operator that would improve the quality of phone calls made to the U.S.

Indosat, meanwhile, plans to launch its VoIP service by the second quarter of this year, with VoIP installations already completed in Jakarta, Medan, Surabaya and Batam.