Indonesia's Data Center Ransomware Attack: DPR Member Suspects Maintenance Fund Misappropriation

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Deputy Chairman of Commission III of Indonesian House of Representatives (DPR) Ahmad Sahroni responded to the recent hacking experienced by the temporary National Data Center (PDN). Sahroni said that he was surprised that the Rp700 billion maintenance fund did not make PDN safe from hacking.

Meanwhile, the temporary PDN managed by the Ministry of Communication and Information or Kemenkominfo and Telkom Sigma has experienced disruption due to ransomware attacks since June 20, 2024. In the case of the PDN hack, the hackers used a new type of malware or ransomware called LockBit 3.0 Brain Chiper.

Sahroni suspects that the PDN maintenance funds, which amount to hundreds of billions, are not being used properly. "It is reasonable to suspect that there are allegations of fraud there, there are incompetent individuals at PDN," said Sahroni in a written statement on Sunday, June 30, 2024.

He questioned the performance of the parties responsible for maintaining PDN. "With funds of that size, the cyber protection can easily be breached and cannot be restored. Right, it doesn't make sense, so what are they doing all this time with that much money?" said the NasDem Party politician.

Sahroni stated that the PDN hacking incident this time was very fatal and embarrassing. The reason is, this incident shows that the Indonesian state has been rendered helpless in the face of cyber attacks.

Therefore, Sahroni said that someone must be responsible for this incident. "Don't just get away with a thousand excuses without any improvement," he said.

It is known that the Minister of Finance, Sri Mulyani, revealed that the Ministry of Communication and Information has spent Rp4.9 trillion in the APBN until May 2024. This budget includes Rp1.6 trillion for maintenance and operation of 4G BTS towers and Rp700 billion for PDN maintenance.

PT Telkom Indonesia Senior Vice President Ahmad Reza responded to the allegations made by Sahroni. It is known that a subsidiary of PT Telkom Indonesia, namely PT Telkomsigma, was appointed by the Ministry of Communication and Information as a temporary PDN cloud computing service provider. "Regarding PDN or PDNS, all domains are in Kominfo and all information comes out from there," said Reza via short message on Sunday, June 30 2024.

Tempo has asked for responses from the Ministry of Communication and Information and Telkom regarding the alleged misappropriation of funds submitted by Sahroni. However, the Director General of Information and Public Communications, Kominfo, Usman Kansong, and the Director General of Applications and Informatics, Kominfo, Semuel Abrijani Pangerapan, have not responded to the short message sent.

SULTAN ABDURRAHMAN

Editor's Choice: Kominfo Minister Vows to Regulate Mandatory Data Backup After Ransomware Attack on PDNS

Click here to get the latest news updates from Tempo on Google News