Police arrest man and woman for spreading hoax about election servers being rigged in Jokowi’s favor

Fake news is once again a major concern for authorities ahead of Indonesia’s elections on April 17. One particular conspiracy theory that is being spread by some of presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto’s supporters (and even some of his high-level campaign officials) involves questioning the integrity of the election, often utilizing misinformation about vote fraud or misinformation.

One example of that was a recent viral video accusing Indonesia’s General Election Commission (KPU) of having servers in Singapore that have already been set to make sure incumbent President Joko Widodo and his running mate Ma’ruf Amin will win the election by 57%.

KPU quickly denied the allegations, with the commission’s chairman, Hasyim Azhari, adamant that they had no servers outside of Indonesia.

Not only that, KPU filed a defamation report with the police over the video, which led to arrests over the weekend of a man and woman allegedly involved in the video’s creation and dissemination.

“The two suspects spread the fake news work as both creators and buzzers. One was arrested in Ciracas, East Jakarta, on Saturday morning, another suspect was arrested in Lampung,” said National Police spokesperson Dedi Prasetyo today as quoted by Detik.

Dedi said that the female suspect, identified by her initials RD, was a housewife who was currently undergoing questioning at the Lampung Regional Police.

Meanwhile, police say the other suspect, identified by the initials EW, runs a website that helped spread the fake news as well as social media accounts with large numbers of followers.

According to Dede, police seized evidence from the suspects including their social media accounts along with their cell phones and telephone sim cards.

Police have not yet specified what role the two suspects played in making and/or distributing the video but, according to the police’s cybercrime subdivision, the suspects will be charged under an article of the Criminal Code banning the creation and dissemination of false news that can create a public disturbance, which carries a potential sentence of up to three years.

Several people have been arrested for allegedly spreading fake news about the upcoming election. Perhaps the most high-profile involved three middle-aged women who were seen in a viral video going door-to-door campaigning for Prabowo while lying about President Joko Widodo wanting to legalize gay marriage and ban the Islamic call to prayer. The three were later arrested by the police.

Many suspect that Prabowo’s camp is spreading conspiracy theories about voter fraud in order to lay the groundwork for a recount in the event that the vote is close (or perhaps a face-saving excuse in the event that Prabowo loses to Jokowi by a large margin, as the majority of recent polling still predicts he will).



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