- 03/05/2016
- Category: Commentaries
Having first launched in June 2013 in New Zealand, the project idea Google Internet bubble, Project Loon, will conduct a technical trial in Indonesia. Project Loon is a research and development conducted by Google in order to provide cheap and affordable internet package and access for people in remote and disadvantaged areas. Project Loon uses air balloon placed in the stratosphere at an altitude of about 20 km to create a wireless network on the air at speeds resembling a 3G network.
The Air balloons can maneuver to adjust its height to fly following the direction of the winds in the stratosphere, with the speed and direction set up by the wind speed data at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The users are facilitated by this project can be connected to the internet using a special antenna on the infrastructure or their homes. Each balloon will emit 4G LTE internet connection to the surface with a range of 40 kilometers from where the balloon is located. The balloon will drive technology Long Term Evolution (LTE) of Indonesia’s telecommunication companies that have partnered with Google’s Project Loon, namely Telkomsel, Indosat and XL Axiata.
Google and the mobile operators will share the spectrum so that the public can access the Internet via a smart phone device and devices that support LTE technology. Loon’s balloon rotate wireless traffic from the mobile device back to the global internet using a high-speed link. The system itself aims to provide cheap internet package and is easily accessible for people in remote areas, especially communication access to the areas affected by disasters, like region of the Philippines hit by typhoon Haiyan some time ago. With the Project Loon is expected that all citizens of the world can be connected through the Internet, as well as providing cheap internet packages for citizens left behind.
Apart from Indonesia’s gains related to Project Loon’s ability to help the spread of connectivity to remote areas, so as to increase Internet penetration in Indonesia, Project Loon’s development in Indonesia triggers a lot of debates. Government is asked to reconsider the decision to implement Project Loon. It is associated with the possible implications of Project Loon. Namely, regarding information security. Project Loon allows all data to be directly bypassed by Google. According to technology analysts, Riant Nugroho, ‘Currently, developed countries compete to extract information from other countries. Formerly, information is obtained from various studies, census bureau, and campus/schools, and such process takes a long time. Now, spying is possible to be done in time, as information is to be fetched at any given moment’.[1] This is because the information from the customer data is not only known by the operator, but Google can also access such information via the balloons which serve as a transmitter and receiver stations (BTS). With the Project Loon, the Government should be ready with all the consequences that accompany it, especially information related to the issue of sovereignty. Start from demographic into data crucial to the specific market needs of segmentation that is easily seen from the data collected by Google. In addition, the debate highlights the Project Loon regarding the independence of the Internet in the country. Nationalistic sentiment appears as the open BTS is marginalized by the Project Loon.[2] Previously, there were related researches on Open BTS developed by local IT practitioners. Open BTS is a network device that can be an alternative for remote areas that do not have the telecommunications network infrastructure. Project Loon is based on BTS operator, while Open BTS is more open. Both equally provide internet access, but Project Loon is already a step ahead in obtaining operational license in Indonesia.
Thus, seeing the debate related to the development of Project Loon, the government should consider wisely. Given that this is not just about the provision of internet access in remote areas, but this also has profound implications on many aspects.
[1] ‘Project Loon Google Bahayakan Kedaulatan RI’, Citra, January 12 2016, http://citraindonesia.com/project-loon-google-bahayakan-kedaulatan-ri/, accesed April 18 2016.
[2] A. Jose, ‘Pro&Kontra Penerapan Google Project Loon di Indonesia’, Kompas, November 5 2015, http://techno.okezone.com/read/2015/11/05/207/1244152/pro-kontra-penerapan-google-project-loon-di-indonesia?page=2, accesed April 2016.
