- 20/01/2021
- Category: Press Release
Yogyakarta, December 11th, 2020 – 2020 is something different than the previous year. The most significant thing is due to the impact of the Covid-19. Many activities have changed drastically from face-to-face activities to virtual activities. This time, the Center for Digital Society will discuss stepping back in 2020 by holding Diffusion 40. This activity discusses various events happening in 2020, especially those discussing new reality and trends. The 40th Diffusion series proudly invited Irnasya Shafira (Research Associate CfDS) and Perdana Karim (Research Assistant CfDS) as speakers. The event on Friday (11/12) was held using the Gmeet platform, and broadcast live via Youtube Livestream.
Irnasya Shafira as a speaker at CfDS Difussion #40, stated that there is a new reality in 2020, where the world changes from conventional or face-to-face activities to completely online and virtual. One of the things that catch attention is the existence of a virtual concert lifting from an animated game in such a way and runs into an interesting concert. This innovation was a form of rapid digital transformation in 2020. It could be seen as one of the impacts of the Covid-19 outbreak, which forces the world community to adapt to the new reality. In her presentation, Irnasya Shafira also shared interesting stories from the book The New Digital Age written by Eric Schmidt, ex-Google CEO, and Jared Cohen, ex-Google Idea Director. The book explains the future in the digital age world, where there is a new identity in the future life, the trends in the future, and what might happen in accelerating technology. In 2013, the book was only a hypothesis, but it has become a reality where all activities are carried out in the virtual world in less than ten years.
In addition, Irnasya added that creating a virtual life also has an impact on privacy data security. All digital wealth parts will be related to personal data protection, where everyone has the right to have confidential personal data. As a consequence, these changes would also have an impact on the risks that will occur in cybercrime. Irnasya closed his presentation by stating that “future life will be more prevalent in the virtual world, which is for the sake of work. Therefore, the Center for Digital Society (CfDS) will be very relevant in the future.”
Digital Transformation in Indonesia
The creation of virtual reality is also happening in Indonesia. Based on Perdana’s presentation, the Indonesian government made five digital transformation plans, including expanding access and improving digital infrastructure, preparing digital transportation roadmaps in various strategic sectors; and accelerating national data centers’ integration preparing the needs of digital talent, and preparing regulations. According to Perdana, the development of digital transformation in Indonesia is quite good, but in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, Indonesia is still said to be lacking. APJII’s survey noted that Indonesia’s internet users reached 196.70 million, but the distribution of telecommunications in Indonesia is still far from perfect.
Perdana added that even though Indonesia is listed in the 88th rank of 191 countries implementing e-government (according to the UN report), Indonesia is still lagging at the ASEAN level, which is in the bottom four ranks. Also, infrastructure in Indonesia is still deficient. Perdana stated several steps that the government and society need to take before carrying out Indonesia’s digital transformation. The government needs to build an adequate and equitable telecommunication infrastructure and pass the Personal Data Protection Bill. Likewise, from the point of view of Indonesian society, it is also necessary to know themselves with services/products that are entirely digital, improve their understanding of digital skills, and improve their digital literacy. Perdana Karim emphasized that “before carrying out digital transformation, Indonesia needs to improve the management of public goods in Indonesia.”
Writer: Farida Ari
Editor: Ruth T. Simanjuntak
