One of the biggest factors contributing to the huge buildup of the protest against Jakarta Governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama being organized by Islamic hardline groups for tomorrow has been the spread of hoaxes and fake news stories online seemingly designed to stoke the flames of hatred against the the governor and his allies in the government. This has led many to suspect that there is somebody or some organization behind the misinformation campaign.
While no mastermind behind the online attacks have yet been named, the government is following up on its promise to combat hate speech online, most recently with the announcement by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (Menkominfo) that it had blocked 11 websites for containing SARA content (an Indonesian acronym used to describe attacks based on race, religion and ethnicity).
The Directorate-General for Informatics Applications at Menkominfo just issued a letter of notification to internet service providers to block the sites, stating: “With this, please add these 11 sites that contain SARA content into your filtering system.”
The 11 sites named in the letter are lemahirengmedia.com, portalpiyungan.com, suara-islam.com, smstauhiid.com, beritaislam24h.com, bersatupos.com, pos-metro.com, jurnalmuslim.com, media-nkri.net, lontaranews.com and nusanews.com.
The head of public relations for Menkominfo, Noor Iza, said that most of the sites were reported for SARA content by the public and institutions, but admitted that they might have been blocked now at least in part due to their role in increasing tensions ahead of tomorrow’s protest.
“It could have something to do with that [the protest] but frankly it is the ministry that carried out the assessment. The site manager can contact us if they have objections,” he said as quoted by Detik.
Noor Iza also said that the ministry was attempting to clamp down on SARA content being spread on social media and said that many accounts had been reported to the police and about 30 had been removed.
Despite the ministry’s attempts, there is no doubt that there are far more than 11 websites and 30 social media accounts spreading religious and racial hatred on the Indonesian internet. Perhaps if they spent less time and resources blocking all of the porn online and more time stamping out hateful information that could lead to violence, the situation wouldn’t have gotten this bad.
