Indonesian MSMEs unite on cybersecurity

Almost 80 Indonesian businesses have become part of a new and emerging network that will help others to adopt cybersecurity practices.

They have all completed a course in cybersecurity skills and celebrated the completion with a “digital party” in March. All 77 have been invited to become part of a Community of Practice to build on what they have learnt about making their online business safer, and to encourage others to do the same.

Funded by the Australian Government through DFAT’s E-commerce Aid for Trade Initiative, the program titled ‘Cybersecurity Skills for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises’ provides small business owners a series of webinars and offline exercises on cybersecurity and global trade. The objective was to reduce the range of cyber threats and risks to growing a business, understand the regulations of digital trade including the protection of personal data as well understanding the commercial opportunities that are being opened up with the new IA-CEPA Agreement that came into effect in July last year.

The program was delivered by the Australia-Indonesia Centre (AIC) in partnership with Indonesia’s National Cyber and Crypto Agency (BSSN), the Ministry of Cooperative and MSMEs (Kemenkop UKM) and the Association of Information Systems Indonesia Chapter (AISINDO).

Learn more about the Cybersecurity Skills for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises program

Dr Tony Dwi Susanto, former President of AISINDO and also a lecturer at Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember (ITS) opened and moderated the celebratory webinar and Prof Caroline Chan, Program leader of the E-commerce and Cyber Security for MSME Program, delivered a presentation about program milestones and achievements and the statistics of participants who completed the course later on.

“I am so proud that 77 out of 127 or 61 % of selected participants across 14 provinces in Indonesia were able to complete the program, especially as the majority of them, or 65 %, were women.” said Professor Chan.

On behalf of the AIC, Dr Eugene Sebastian congratulated the participants for completing the course and also to the team for their effort in delivering such a successful training program. He expressed a hope that this program would help Indonesian entrepreneurs to thrive in a competitive global market.

“I hope that through this program the participants can reduce the risk of cyber threats to their business, understand the importance of protecting personal data and be able to increase their digital sales and export their products so that MSMEs in Indonesia can be more successful and compete in the digital era and the global market.”

Following Dr Sebastian, Bapak Anton Setiyawan from BSSN expressed appreciation to the great efforts taken by all of the stakeholders involved in this program and said that this is an excellent form of cooperation in the cybersecurity sector between Indonesia and Australia.

“Digital transformation requires a variety of capabilities, including cybersecurity. We are happy that the joint collaboration between the two countries, supported by the government agencies, academics and businesses, has resulted in something extraordinary today”, he said, noting the number of MSMEs completing the program.

Ibu Destry Anna Sari from the Ministry of Cooperatives and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises hoped that this program will continue to support more entrepreneurs to gain the variety of skills needed to enter global trade as the demand for this program was very high.

“We are open for collaboration to replicate this kind of program. Many entrepreneurs feel disappointed that, due to limited places they were not yet selected to participate in this program.” said Ibu Sari.

Following the opening statements from the AIC and supporting partners, three business owners were called to represent the participants in receiving their e-certificates. They were Ibu Anindya Sukarni, Founder and CEO of Miumosa, proposed by the Ministry; Ibu Rita Indriany, Founder dan CEO of Acuksae, proposed by the Government of Bandung; and Ibu Widya Esthi Riany, Founder and CEO of Lula Pasta, proposed by the Government of Jakarta.

Learn more about the Cybersecurity Skills for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises program

Part of the work of participants was to create a cybersecurity poster to promote the importance of this issue to the public. Dr Susanto announced the winners of the cybersecurity poster and video competition while displaying the winning programs. The prizes for best posters were won by Ibu Gina Widya Puspita from Nagina Art Decor and Bapak Sugeng Hariyanto from Sicash Makmor won the prize for video competition.

Participants who completed the program can help foster a stronger culture of cybersecurity and further enhance their competencies in developing and implementing strategies that protect their businesses as well as their customers and business partners. Small businesses will also be invited to join the Community of Practice (CoP) online and potentially to participate in future face-to-face seminars post-pandemic.

The CoP will encourage the sharing of information, key insights and present the potential to leverage a network of growing small businesses interested in learning and expanding their business online and globally.