Police, Internet industry join forces to stop cyberfraud
Fitri Wulandari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Alarmed by the rise in cyberfraud, which has seriously tainted Indonesia's image in the global Web community, the National Police and Internet industry players have agreed to join forces to crack down on the crime.
Heru Nugroho, the secretary-general of the Indonesian Internet Service Providers Association (APJII), said on Monday that the association and the police would soon set up a special task force to combat the crime.
Heru said the rise in cyberfraud in Indonesia over the past couple of years had not only sparked an international outcry but also caused fears that it would eventually harm the country's nascent Internet industry.
"The International community could block an IP (Internet Protocol) number from Indonesia out of fear of cyberfraud. In which case, people would not be interested to use the Internet as they would not be able to surf freely," he added.
While it is too early to disseminate details on the task force, Heru said that it would include players in the Internet industry, such as the Association of Indonesian Internet Cafes (Awari), legal advisors and government agencies.
Cyberfraud happens when a carder, a popular term known among the industry for perpetrators of cyberfraud, conducts a transaction with online merchants using other people's credit card numbers.
They can obtain millions of credit card numbers by penetrating a merchant's database. They usually conduct the transactions at Internet cafes to avoid being traced.
Not only does cyberfraud or carding inflict losses on the cardholders, but also the merchants, merchants' banks and card issuers.
Sr. Commr. Dewa Bagus Made Suharya, the head of the information technology crime division at National Police Headquarters, said the police considered cyberfraud a serious crime, which needs special action.
"Cyberfraud is no different from any other crime. There will be punishment for it," he said.
According to the police's IT crime division, since its establishment in 2001, they have received as many as 104 reports on cyberfraud.
While he said he could not give out any details, Dewa noted that a cyberfraud transaction ranges between US$100 and $13,000.
The concern over rising cyberfraud is not baseless. Recent research by Texas-based security company ClearCommerce ranked Indonesia second after the Ukraine for cyberfraud.
The research, conducted from mid-2000 until the end of 2001, and involving 1,137 merchants, six million transactions and 40,000 customers, revealed that 20 percent of the total number of credit card transactions on the Internet in Indonesia were cyberfraud.
Further, Heru added that cyberfraud had also inflicted losses on people who honestly wanted to do online transactions as they would be rejected by merchants.
He said for the past two years more and more online merchants were blockading IP numbers from Indonesia and even rejecting online transactions to and from Indonesia.
Dewa said that the police had identified Yogyakarta, Semarang, Bandung and Jakarta as safe havens for cyberfraud. Syndicates are suspected to be thriving in Indonesia.
He said that legal action against carders was still lenient as cybercrime is an alien area for law enforcers.
In Indonesia, Dewa said, only Yogyakarta was ready to start legal proceedings against arrested carders.
In addition, the police is moving to develop investigation tools to support cybercrime investigations, such as using technology to turn digital data into court evidence.