Indonesia has blocked search engine website Yahoo, payments firm PayPal and several gaming websites for failure to comply with licensing rules, an official said on Saturday, sparking a backlash on social media.
Registration is required under the rules issued at the end of November 2020 and would give authorities broad powers to compel platforms to disclose certain users’ data, and take down content deemed illegal or ” disturbs public order” within four hours if necessary and within 24 hours if not.
Several tech companies rushed to register days after the deadline, which was extended to Friday, including Alphabetmeta key Facebook, instagramAnd WhatsAppAnd heroine,
Samuel Abrijani Pangerapan, a senior official at Indonesia’s Ministry of Communications, said in a text message that the websites that have been blocked include Yahoo, Paypaland gaming sites like Steam, Dota 2, counter attackAnd epic gamesamong others.
PayPal, Yahoo’s parent private equity firm Apollo Global Management, and US game developer valve, which runs Steam, Dota and Counter-Strike, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Epic Games could not be reached for comment.
Hashtags like “BlokirKominfo” (Ministry of Block Communications), Epic Games and Paypal are trending on Indonesian TwitterWith many writing messages criticizing the government’s move as harming Indonesia’s online gaming industry and the freelance workers who use PayPal.
Pangerapan did not respond to a request for comment.
With an estimated 191 million Internet users and a young, social-media savvy population, the Southeast Asian nation is a significant market for a number of technology platforms.
© Thomson Reuters 2022