The use of social media, of course, must be used wisely, considering that this application is easily accessible to anyone and each user can upload any content, including provocative content, hoaxes and so on.
One of the hoax news that most often appears is hoax related to election preparations, considering that elections are a big national event involving all people who have registered as voters. One of the hoaxes that was uncovered was the hoax video on the leak of the 2024 election results circulating on social media.
The Director of Cybercrime (Bareskrim) of the National Police, Brigadier General Adi Vivid Agustiadi, said that his party was coordinating with the General Elections Commission (KPU) regarding the hoax video of leaking the 2024 election results.
Vivid said, indeed there was information circulating that the data at the KPU had been leaked. However, the KPU itself has denied this information. Therefore, Bareskrim together with the KPU conducted an investigation of who uploaded or uploaded the leaked data for the first time.
Vivid said that his party was conducting profiling. If later during the profiling period there is a criminal element, of course it will be followed up. In addition, he appealed to the public to be careful in using social media, especially ahead of the 2024 Election. According to him, people should be able to use social media for positive things.
He also gave the example of a researcher from the National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN), Andi Prince Hasanudin, who was arrested for his remarks on social media. For this reason, he said Bareskrim would carry out cyber patrols.
After tracing it, his party found a video showing vote data for the 2024 election, which is suspected to have come from the KPU. The video was uploaded by a Twitter account named @Bams27735590 which displays the alleged power of the 2024 election results.
The 2-minute 19-second video was also uploaded with a tweet that read: THIS IS DATA KPU 2024 ELECTION RESULTS. Incredibly, this country is indeed sacred, voting has not yet been conducted, the results have already been determined.
For this reason, people need to equip themselves with good political communication literacy to be able to stop the spread of hoaxes. Literacy provisions are needed so that people who will become voters in the 2024 election will have a wise understanding and attitude in welcoming the upcoming democratic party.
Please note that hoax is information that is engineered to cover up real information. Or it can also be interpreted as an attempt to twist facts using convincing information but the truth cannot be verified.
Apart from that, there is also a hoax which reports that the voter card for the 2024 election will be in digital form. In the picture circulating on social media, you can see the KPU logo and identity data such as name, gender and place of voting.
In fact, the KPU denied that it had issued the voter card. The KPU has emphasized that it did not make and issue the voter cards. In accordance with the election law, the KPU does not have the duty or authority to make and issue voter cards.
On different occasions, the Indonesian National Police (POLRI) have taken various measures to anticipate the spread of fake news related to the 2024 ELECTION. Moreover, in 2022, the National Police have received 113 reports related to this case, the number is almost four times more than the reports in 2021, namely 33 case.
Data on the Robinopsnal Bareskrim Polri e-MP show that there has been an increase in the number of prosecutions, reporters and reported parties from 2021 to 2022. This shows that the number of prosecutions for hoax news is ahead of the 2024 Election.
There are two ways that the Police do, namely preventive and persuasive. The form is to educate the public so they don’t easily believe the news circulating on social media. When getting information, the public needs to pay close attention to the source of the uploader and spreader.
The public, of course, needs to understand that social media users are always being watched by the police and the government. When spreading hoaxes, politics and the government will identify whether the upload has the potential to break unity and unity.
Law No. 19 of 2016 concerning amendments to Law No. 11 of 2008 concerning information and electronic transactions regulates scanning of cases of spreading fake news. Perpetrators who spread false information face a maximum prison sentence of six years and/or a maximum fine of IDR 1 billion.
The police themselves have organized a Criminal Information Center (Pusiknas). Pusiknas itself is under Bareskrim which supports Polri’s performance, especially in the field of criminal information management based on information and communication technology as well as criminal data services both internal and external to Polri.
Elections are hot moments that can bring a lot of attention, this is what makes people have to be aware of the various news broadcast in various media.
)* The author is a contributor to Duta Media