Indonesia’s tax agency is investigating Reuters’ alleged breach of personal data

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesia’s tax agency is investigating an alleged data breach that exposed the taxpayer identification numbers of millions of Indonesians, including President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, his ministers and his two sons, an official said.

A series of cyber attacks have hit Indonesian companies and government agencies in recent years, which experts attribute to the government’s lax protection of personal data.

Teguh Aprianto, a cyber security expert, posted a screenshot on social media platform X on Wednesday, which contains samples of the national identity and taxpayer identification numbers of 6 million Indonesians, including Jokowi and some of his ministers.

The tax agency is looking into “circulating information about a data breach,” Dwi Astuti, an agency official, said Wednesday evening, without giving details.

Reuters could not immediately confirm the legitimacy of the data breach. Jokowi’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Teguh told Reuters that exposing taxpayer data could attract targeted attacks from scam operations that “could lead to material or immaterial losses”, adding that it could also expose people’s income or transaction data.

The alleged breach follows a ransomware attack in June that crippled several government services such as immigration and operations at major airports, prompting the government to conduct an audit.