Jakarta. Communication and Informatics Minister Budi Arie Setiadi revealed that since taking office on July 17, 2023, his ministry has taken down 1.9 million online gambling contents up until May 21, 2024.

Additionally, the Ministry of Communication and Informatics has requested the Financial Services Authority (OJK) and Bank Indonesia (BI) to block bank accounts and digital wallets associated with online gambling. So far, 5,364 bank accounts have been proposed for blocking by the OJK, and 555 digital wallets by BI.

Budi Arie announced that President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo had directed the formation of a more comprehensive task force to implement concrete steps in eradicating online gambling.

"The formation of the online gambling task force is a commitment from the government to systematically and measurably eradicate online gambling from upstream to downstream," Budi Arie stated on Wednesday.

According to him, the online gambling eradication task force will be established within one to two weeks. The Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal, and Security Affairs, Hadi Tjahjanto will lead the task force. Budi Arie Setiadi will head the prevention division, while National Police Chief Listyo Sigit Prabowo will lead the enforcement division.

Minister Budi Arie said stern warnings and ultimatums were issued to various social media platforms, including Meta in October 2023 and X (formerly Twitter) in January 2024. These warnings resulted in Meta removing 1.65 million pieces of online gambling content and 450,000 related advertisements from August to October 2023.

Enforced in January, the law governing electronic transactions and information explicitly prohibits online gambling, imposing severe penalties of up to 10 years imprisonment and fines of up to Rp 10 billion ($645,000) for operators found guilty of running gambling sites.

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