[PRESS RELEASE] Trapped by Algorithms: Surrender or Turn Back | Digital Experts Talk #9

Yogyakarta 21 April 2022 – Today, the Indonesian people’s use of e-commerce and social commerce platforms cannot be separated from Algorithmic Decision Making (ADM) technology. ADM is a particular type of algorithm that is intended to support decision-making.

In Digital Expert Talk #8, CfDS researcher Faiz Rahman stated that using ADM can help e-commerce or social media platforms provide and maximize services to sellers and buyers based on the data entered by these users. However, ADM also has negative impacts, for example, “dark patterns”.

“ADM has the potential to direct users to dark patterns, where ADM directs or deceives users into making unwanted and potentially dangerous decisions,” added Faiz.

In line with this, Mulya Amri, a researcher at CfDS, added that platform users do not have autonomy over their data because they need the platform.

“We know that we provide data to the platform, that data has the potential to leak. However, on the other hand, sometimes we need to use the platform so that we can only surrender the data,” said Muly.

As a regulatory observer and member of the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP), Bhredipta Socarana said that there are often differences between existing legal practices and norms. Therefore Bhredipta hopes the industry can take care of each other and use the data appropriately and according to the law.

“Not only that, the platform should not exclude itself from responsibility for personal data and allow both sellers and machine learning to manage data without industry oversight,” said Bhredipta.

Lastly, as an academic, Dr. Sih Yuliana Wahyuningtyas again reminded us about the bargaining position of consumers as data subjects who tend to be more vulnerable than platforms, business actors or related data controllers in the digital industry. Such a legal framework regarding the protection of personal data is essential to ensure consumers’ fundamental rights to security when transacting; without the need to be based on the presence or absence of material losses experienced. While waiting for the ratification and implementation of regulations, consumers are also advised to be more careful in sharing their data when using digital platforms for transactions or other things.

This activity was organized with the support of the Consumer Protection in ASEAN (PROTECT) project, which was created by Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH and funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).