Sexual Violence Eradication Bill to Cover Digital Realm

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The head of the work committee (Panja) on the sexual violence eradication bill (RUU PKS), Willy Aditya, said that the bill will cover sexual violence in the digital realm. 

“In the digital world, we will synchronize it with the Pornography Law and ITE Law (electronics information and transactions law),” said Aditya on July 23, Antaranews reported. “Our lives have transformed to the digital era, which means sexual violence also takes place there.”

The work committee is currently reviewing the aspects in the synchronization, mainly to prevent the two laws contradicting each other. Aditya also cited the online prostitution phenomena emergence that has involved underaged groups.

The six aspects mentioned in the online gender-based violence guidelines established by Kusuma and Arum (2020) are privacy violations, monitoring, reputation damages, online harassment, threats of violence, and community targeting. 

Aditya argued that the Criminal Code (KUHP) in its current state is not enough to be used as a legal basis in processing violations of sexual violence in greater detail. This is the main reason why the sexual violence eradication draft bill is urgently needed to fill the void in the KUHP.

The RUU PKS has been discussed in legislation for more than eight years all while sexual violence recorded continues to increase in Indonesia. In 2020 alone, the country logged 2,945 cases of sexual violence against women in public and private spaces. 

Read: The Iceberg of Digital Predators

ANTARA