President Joko Widodo has underscored the critical need for comprehensive data backup measures following the recent hacking of the Temporary National Data Center (PDNS) 2 in Surabaya. Speaking at PT Hyundai LG Indonesia (HLI) Green Power in Karawang, West Java, on Wednesday (3/7), President Jokowi emphasized that all national data must be backed up to prevent similar incidents in the future.
"The most important thing is that everything must be found a solution so it doesn't happen again, all our national data should be backed up so that if an incident occurs, we are not taken by surprise," President Jokowi stated.
He also highlighted that data hacking incidents are not unique to Indonesia, asserting that other countries face similar challenges. "This also happens in other countries, not just in Indonesia," he noted.
The hacking of PDNS 2 has brought the issue of data backup into sharp focus. Head of the National Cyber and Encryption Agency (BSSN), Hinsa Siburian, revealed during a recent hearing with Commission I DPR that there was no backup data for PDNS 2, which had fallen victim to a ransomware attack.
"Our checks show that there is no [data] backup," Hinsa reported. According to BSSN Regulation No. 4 of 2021 concerning Guidelines for Information Security Management of Electronic-Based Government Systems, data backup is mandatory at the National Data Center. However, only about 2 percent of the data from PDNS 2 had been backed up at PDNS Batam.
Minister of Communication and Information Technology (Menkominfo) Budi Arie Setiadi acknowledged during the same hearing that budget constraints are a significant barrier to data backup efforts across various government agencies.
"We continue to encourage tenants to back up. However, the policy is up to the tenants. This is not to blame the tenants; this should be our joint evaluation," Minister Budi explained. "Sometimes tenants also have difficulty procuring backup infrastructure due to budget constraints or difficulties explaining the urgency of backups to financial authorities or auditors," he added.
The Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal, and Security Affairs (Menko Polhukam) Hadi Tjahjanto has mandated that all ministries and agencies must have data backups to mitigate the impact of potential future cyberattacks.
"Each tenant or ministry must also have a backup; this is mandatory, not optional anymore," Minister Hadi emphasized. He also stated that the government plans to implement layered security backups to prevent recurrence of such problems, including upgrading the cold site in Batam to a hot site.
"So if the Temporary National Data Center operates and encounters disruptions, there will still be a backup in the DRC or hot site in Batam that can provide autogate interactive services, and each data center owner will also have a backup," he explained. This strategy aims to create three to four layers of backups to mitigate data loss effectively.
Additionally, Minister Hadi mentioned that data would be backed up with zoned cloud backups, specifically for general data like statistics, to avoid overburdening PDNS capacity.
The PDNS 2 has been crippled since June 20 due to a ransomware attack, which locks data within systems. This attack has rendered most of the data in the center, housing 282 central and regional government institutions, inaccessible.
The perpetrators demanded a ransom of $8 million, or around IDR 131 billion, to unlock the data. However, the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology has firmly stated it will not pay the ransom.
In a surprising turn, the ransomware gang Brain Chiper, suspected of being behind the PDNS 2 hack, has claimed they will provide the decryption key for the locked data for free.
"People of Indonesia, we apologize for the fact that [this attack] has affected everyone," the user account brain chiper stated on a dark forum, as reported by cyber intelligence company StealthMole. "We also ask for the understanding and assurance of the public that we have made this decision consciously and independently."
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