The question on many a Jakartans’ mind over the weekend was who put up the public porn display on a huge LED billboard (locally known as a Videotron) at an intersection in Kebayoran Baru, South Jakarta last Friday afternoon. The company in charge of putting content up on the billboard claimed a hacker was responsible for the 5-minute show that shocked the city, and it looks like they may have been telling the truth as police said yesterday that they have now arrested the hacker behind the porn plot.
“We arrested the culprit in his office in the Senopati area, South Jakarta today (Tuesday),” said Jakarta Metro Police Chief Mochamad Iriawan, as quoted by Kompas yesterday.
Iriawan said that the suspect is a 24-year-old man identified by the initials SAR. He’s an IT expert who’s employed at a data analysis company based in Senopati.
But the way he “hacked” into the Videotron was not through a virus, as claimed by the billboard’s operator. According to SAR, he was driving through the intersection at one point when he noticed that the Videotron’s operator had left their username and password displayed on the screen. SAR snapped a photo of the information and used it to access to the Videotron’s administrative controls remotely using a computer in his office.
SAR admitted that he used his access to deliberately play Japanese porn on the Videotron, which was on display for around 5 minutes before power to the billboard was cut off by city administrators, just for fun.
But SAR’s fun seeking will very likely land him in serious trouble with the law. SAR may be charged with violating laws on immorality and the Information and Electronic Transactions Act (UU ITE), which could carry a 7-year prison sentence and a fine of Rp 15 billion.
The police are still investigating the possibility of the involvement of other parties, and whether or not SAR had other motives for the public porn display.
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