Similar to Korea's Telecommunications Business Act
The Ministry of Communication and Information Technology of Indonesia is considering introducing a new bill to make major content providers responsible for maintaining the quality of communication services.
The bill is similar to the latest version of the Telecommunications Business Act of South Korea. According to the version, which became effective late last year, the duty is imposed on every value added common carrier whose average daily user count for the fourth quarter of the preceding year is one million or more and whose data traffic in South Korea is 1 percent or more of its total traffic. At present, Google, Facebook, Netflix, Naver, Kakao and Content Wavve are subject to the law.
The bill in Indonesia stipulates the same figures regarding the user count and data traffic. South Korean companies must bear the responsibility if the bill is adopted.
The examples include Naver Webtoon, which is one of the most popular Google Play cartoon apps in Indonesia and Thailand. Naver announced in March this year that it would invest US$150 million in Emtek, the biggest total media company in Indonesia. The company with the ninth-largest market cap in Indonesia is running over-the-top video streaming service Vidio and the two biggest public TV channels in the country while producing and distributing original content.
Kakao, in the meantime, entered the Southeast Asian market in 2018 by acquiring NeoBazar for 13.8 billion won in Indonesia. Last year, Coupang took over HOOQ, a local OTT service provider.