Jakarta (Antara) – The Communications and Informatics Ministry (Kominfo) identified an average of 4-6 daily hoax contents across the internet and social media platforms in January with a total of 175 contents from social to political issues.

Kominfo on Tuesday said that the largest amount of contents they detected was on January 22, 2019, with 11 contents in a single day.

The total amount fake contents in January saw 81 of them was related to the General Elections (Pemilu) such as the tampering of voting ballots in Tanjung Priok, issues of PKI (Indonesian Communist Party), up to finger gestures used in campaigns.

22 contents were related to particular incidents such as the suicide attempt in Sukorajo, a video of a person that was alive again after being buried for four days, and a fake promo on an OVO cashback deal.

The government was also a target of 31 hoax contents and nine contents regarding Uyghur Muslims and Friday prayer ban at a Chinese-run enterprise.

The rest of the troubling contents were about natural disasters, fake tips on dangerous foods, tech tips, traffic accidents, and the environment.

Kominfo also said that public figures that were mentioned in the hoax contents and ranks President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo first on the list followed by Ahok and Ustadz Arifin Ilham.

Source: https://en.tempo.co/read/1172615/kominfo-175-hoax-contents-plague-the-internet-in-january