Writer: Xirui Li, NTU
Cross-border knowledge flows have been a precedence on the G20 agenda since 2019. This yr isn’t any exception. Indonesia, which holds the G20 Presidency in 2022, has promised to advertise discussions on cross-border knowledge flows, organising the Digital Financial system Working Group to facilitate a constructive, productive and inclusive dialogue associated to knowledge governance.
Although Indonesia has totally dedicated to enabling cross-border knowledge flows, the extent to which it promotes ‘knowledge free movement with belief’ — an structure for worldwide cooperation on the movement of information — stays unclear. In keeping with its personal strategy to knowledge governance, Indonesia is prone to impose extra preconditions on the free movement of information and spotlight knowledge sovereignty points on the G20.
Indonesia is the sixteenth largest economic system on this planet with a GDP of US$1.19 trillion in 2021 — and its digital economic system is rising quickly. It’s estimated that Indonesia’s web economic system shall be price US$330 billion by 2030. By going digital, Indonesia can obtain an estimated US$150 billion in financial development by 2025. Realising the good potential of data-based financial development, Indonesia is paying shut consideration to the safety of information safety and privateness by regulating knowledge movement throughout its borders.
Though Indonesia is making progress in selling cross-country knowledge flows, revoking Authorities Regulation 82 of 2012 (a provision which required economy-wide knowledge localisation) in 2019, it’s nonetheless usually criticised for its remaining knowledge localisation legal guidelines.
Justified for the sake of defending public and nationwide safety, Authorities Regulation 71 of 2019 requires that every one public sector knowledge have to be managed, saved and processed in Indonesia. Except the receiving nation has the identical private knowledge requirements and degree of safety as Indonesia, authorities Regulation 80 of 2019 additionally forbids the switch of private knowledge offshore.
Indonesia has additionally imposed strict sector-based controls on cross-border knowledge flows. Financial institution Indonesia and the Monetary Companies Authority have imposed localisation mandates for companies within the monetary sector. Regulation Number one/POJK.07/2013 prohibits the switch of private knowledge to a 3rd social gathering by monetary providers suppliers except the buyer’s written consent is obtained.
As soon as the draft Private Knowledge Safety Invoice passes, laws specifying strict necessities for and situations on the transmission of private knowledge outdoors of the nation’s borders, Indonesia will be part of international locations with stringent rules on private knowledge safety reminiscent of Brazil, China and India. The United Nations has recognized Indonesia as a rustic with a restrictive strategy to cross-border knowledge flows because of these legal guidelines and rules.
Indonesia’s home strategy to regulating knowledge flows prioritises the significance of information to nationwide safety over its financial worth, so Indonesia is advocating for knowledge sovereignty within the worldwide area.
Indonesian Minister of Communications and Info Expertise Johnny G Plate referred to as for knowledge sovereignty in regulating cross-border knowledge flows at each the 2020 G20 Digital Financial system Ministers’ Assembly and the primary ASEAN Digital Minister’s Assembly in 2021. Plate additionally not too long ago underscored the connection between knowledge safety and sovereignty, affirming the geostrategic nature of information.
So although Indonesia adheres to the idea of ‘knowledge free movement with belief’, a precept on which G20 members have achieved consensus since 2019, it has emphasised defining ‘belief’ slightly than searching for methods to permit the default free movement of information.
Because it requires the respect of information sovereignty and safety in its G20’s Sherpa Observe, Indonesia is advocating 4 rules for cross-border knowledge flows — lawfulness, equity, transparency and reciprocity. These 4 pillars search to facilitate international knowledge governance and benefit from digital financial alternatives whereas defending nationwide sovereignty and safety.
From Indonesia’s vantage level, the final precept is the most essential one. Reciprocity implies that international locations that obtain knowledge ought to have a degree of safety equal to, or increased than, the international locations from which the info is produced — permitting international locations to construct belief.
By recognising the significance of information to its financial growth, Indonesia is shaping knowledge governance domestically and internationally. Wanting ahead to the G20, cross-border knowledge flows will definitely emerge as a serious theme. However the extent to which Indonesia will promote knowledge free movement stays to be seen.
Indonesia’s efforts to outline belief up to now appear to point its view that nationwide and public safety are conditions for cross-border knowledge flows. Indonesia could convey the idea of information sovereignty to the G20 throughout its Presidency whereas additionally pushing different G20 members to make clear the circumstances below which knowledge will be transferred freely.
Xirui Li is a PhD candidate on the S Rajaratnam College of Worldwide Research, Nanyang Technological College (NTU), Singapore, and a Analysis Fellow on the Intellisia Institute, Guangzhou.
