Indonesia threatens prison time for unauthorized downloads of forest data

Indonesia’s government is imposing new restrictions on access to geospatial data, raising concerns among researchers and activists that it will suppress environmental science and advocacy work in one of the world’s most biodiverse countries. For around a month, visitors to an interactive mapping platform maintained by the Ministry of Forestry have been greeted with a pop-up legal notice warning that the information is “view-only” and that anyone who “downloads” or “extracts” it without the ministry’s written permission “will be prosecuted” under the 2008 Electronic Information and Transactions, or ITE, Law. Anyone who wants to use the once freely accessible platform, known as SIGAP, must first agree to “terms and conditions” stating that the relevant articles in the ITE Law “carry penalties of up to 9 years in prison and/or a fine of up to Rp 3 billion [$170,000],” the notice says. On Sept. 21, the ministry’s Directorate General of Forestry Planning posted a video to Instagram outlining a new application process that requires prospective users to disclose their research aims and submit supporting documents. Doni Prabowo, the department’s head of forest monitoring and geospatial information, told Mongabay that restrictions were needed because geospatial data had been uncontrolled for a long time, creating opportunities for manipulation and illegal trading of the country’s precious information. “What if somebody manipulates the data and says certain areas are not protected forest [when they really are]? It could be dangerous,” Doni said by phone. He said he’d heard of the ministry’s geospatial data being listed…This article was originally published on

Mongabay