Government to Freeze Bank Accounts Linked to Online Gambling

Jakarta (June 19, 2024) – Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal, and Security Affairs, Hadi Tjahjanto, announced on Wednesday that banking accounts linked to online gambling will be frozen and their funds will be handed over to the state.

“According to a court decision, we will confiscate funds from those accounts and hand them over to the state,” The Indonesia News Agency ‘ANTARA‘ reported he said at a press conference.

According to ‘ANTARA‘ he said that the online gambling eradication task force, through the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK), has identified 4 thousand to 5 thousand banking accounts suspected of having been used for online gambling.

Their data will be submitted to the police for follow-up action and investigation, he informed, adding that the police will order the freezing of the accounts if they are proven to have been used for online gambling and announce it to the public.

In case no one claims a banking account’s ownership within 30 days of it being frozen, the funds in the accounts will be handed over to the state, he informed.

The police’s Criminal Investigation Agency will then trace the owner of the banking account, the coordinating minister said.

“We will trace it, and the police will summon the account owners for investigation and legal measures,” Tjahjanto said.

The coordinating minister affirmed that this will be the first strategy that will be implemented by the task force within one or two weeks to eradicate online gambling.

Meanwhile, PPATK chairperson Ivan Yustiavandana highlighted that the total funds detected on the thousands of banking accounts have reached billions of rupiahs.

“(The funds total) hundreds of billions of rupiahs,” he said. He, however, did not divulge the exact sum.

On June 14, 2024, President Joko Widodo signed Presidential Decision No. 21 of 2024 to establish a special task force for eradicating online gambling headed by Minister Tjahjanto.

“We have managed to take down over 2.1 million online gambling sites,” the President informed.

SOURCE: ANTARA.