Cyber Crime Attempts in Indonesia Surge during Coronavirus Pandemic

JAKARTA, KOMPAS.com – With booming internet use in Indonesia during the coronavirus pandemic, cybercrimes in the country have skyrocketed along with the upward trend.

The National Cyber and Encryption Agency (BSSN) found that during in January-August 2020, there were 190 million cybercrime attempts in Indonesia.

This is four times higher than in the same period last year at 39 million attempts.

Hackers were most active in August during which BSSN recorded nearly 63 million tries, a significant surge from the 5 million recorded in the same period last year.

Read also: Interpol Reports Skyrocketing Cybercrime Attacks during Pandemic

Sigit Kurniawan, Head of Sub Directorate Vulnerability Identification and Risk Measurement for BSSN, said the correlation between the rise in digital crimes and lifestyle changes in society resulting from the pandemic.

The uptick in internet use in Indonesia coupled with a boom in online transactions fueled the country’s digital crime rate.

“During the pandemic, everyone is constantly conducting digital transactions. The more digital transactions there are, the higher the number of criminals.”

Data from Indonesia’s Ministry of Communication and Information Technology concurred that internet use in Indonesia during the pandemic has risen nearly 40 percent.

Read also: Nearly Three in Every Four Indonesians are Internet Users

Members of the Indonesian public have become ever so reliant on the digital world due to social distancing protocols in addition to other trends such as working from home and online learning.

Furthermore, the center of internet use in the country has shifted from office spaces to residential areas which saw a 23 percent uptick during the pandemic.

Although there are reports of more frequent cybercrime attempts in the country, Sigit asserts that BSSN statistics refer to attempts instead of successful cyber crimes itself.

Read also: Indonesia's Digital Economy Potential Hinges on Equal Internet Access

One of the parameters that the BSSN assesses is cyberattacks on hardware by scanning an open port site that would send an SYN scan.

“There are some unusual activities and these are what BSSN categorizes as an attack.”

(Writer: Putri Zakia Salsabila | Editor: Oik Yusuf)

Source: https://tekno.kompas.com/read/2020/10/12/07020007/kejahatan-siber-di-indonesia-naik-4-kali-lipat-selama-pandemi