Google, Meta Bow To Sweeping Taxes, Content Curbs in Indonesia

Alphabet's Google and Meta Platforms's Facebook have submitted to Indonesian regulations that grant Jakarta sweeping powers to shut down content it deems undesirable and tax digital sales. From a report: The US giants were among the last of several internet media platforms that submitted official business registrations in Indonesia, effectively endorsing the new rules. Netflix, Spotify Technology, Meta Platforms' Instagram and ByteDance-owned TikTok have also registered, according to Indonesia's information ministry. Social media operators are facing increasing scrutiny from governments around the world as their market dominance grows. The Indonesia regulations allow the government to block services that fail to remove within 24 hours content that could potentially "incite unrest" or "disturb public order," such as those that promote child pornography or support terrorism. They also allow the government to levy a value-added tax on the sale of digital goods, from content to virtual items.

Simple money-based decision

[drinkypoo]

If governments are smart enough to not kill the goose, they can tax the golden eggs. And of course, make google part of their information-gathering apparatus.

Re:

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

Not Google or Facebook obviously. Just like in China, they looked at how much they'd lose if they pulled out of the country and decided the least costly option is to bow to Indonesia's demands.

For them, it's a bottom line issue, not principles. Corporations have no principles.

Re:

[drinkypoo]

Google was supposedly planning a China-compliant product [theintercept.com] but has no plans to return at this time [youtube.com], presumably because China won't let them in without acting like every other search engine in China, and embedding government employees to monitor and make decisions. Google's whole business model involves being in control of the data, so that's not workable for them.

Re:

[alvinrod]

The principal principle of corporations is just good return on the principal of its investors. Technically it can be anything as defined by the articles of incorporation, but typically it's just a matter of money.

Unfortunately, no one can predict exactly what the best return will be, so diversify your investment portfolio, but you'd be pissed if the companies backing your retirement portfolio didn't operate under those guidelines and instead chased after whatever nonsense may have struck the fancy of the

This seems to conflate two very different issues

[Anonymous Coward]

The content contols may reasonably be controversial - depending on how you define things like "inciting unrest" - but I don't see any case for an international company that wants to sell there to refuse to comply with a sales tax (the locals can fight for whatever tax regiume they like of course).

Yes but...

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

I'm all for curbing the power of giant Big Data monopolies. But if you're doing it invoking child pornography and terrorism, you're even more fucking suspicious than Big Data.

Indonesia's argument does not leave me warm and fuzzy...

Everything old is new again

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Censorship and arrogant taxation on stuff that didn't even exist that long ago. The best of both possible worlds!

Jump back in time 120 years.

Senator: What good is electricity to the home?

Engineer: Senator, in 20 years, you'll be taxing it.

How about standing up for freedom of expression?

[Patrick May]

I would dearly like to see these "tech giants" simply pull out of locations that want to censor their people. Both Google and Facebook can offer their services without having a physical presence in Indonesia. If the government chooses to block content, let them try but don't actively help them.

Re:

[drinkypoo]

All hopes of moral stands vanished when Google removed the evil canary from their mission statement. One might assume that was when they received their PRISM NSL, or maybe it was something even more insidious.