A total of 6 million Indonesian taxpayer-identification numbers (NPWP) have reportedly been leaked and sold for US$10,000 on the Breach Forum website by an account claiming to be the hacker "Bjorka" on Wednesday. In addition to NPWPs, the leaked data includes national identification numbers (NIK), emails, addresses, phone numbers, and other personal information.
In response, the Directorate General of Taxes (DJP) of the Finance Ministry announced that they are investigating the alleged breach of NPWP data.
"Regarding the circulating information on the NPWP data leak, our technical team is currently conducting an in-depth investigation," said Dwi Astuti, Director of Education, Services, and Public Relations at DJP on Wednesday.
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Earlier, Teguh Aprianto, the founder of Ethical Hacker Indonesia, shared a screenshot of the Breach Forum site, indicating that 6 million Indonesian NPWP data had been sold by the "Bjorka" account on Wednesday.
The news of this data leak was also revealed by cybersecurity company Falcon Feeds on X (formerly Twitter). However, Falcon Feeds noted that the authenticity of the information had not yet been verified.
In addition to NPWPs, the leaked data also includes NIKs, addresses, phone numbers, emails, and other personal details. The listed price for the data is Rp 150 million (approximately US$10,000).
Teguh also tweeted on X that the leaked data includes personal information belonging to President Joko Widodo, as well as his sons Gibran Rakabuming Raka and Kaesang Pangarep.
According to Alfons Tanujaya, a cybersecurity expert from Vaksincom, the leaked data appears to be valid. Alfons urged the public to be cautious of potential criminal activities that could arise from this breach.
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One potential risk is tax-related fraud, where scammers could impersonate tax officials using the stolen data.
"People could impersonate tax officials, contact you with accurate data, and claim you have tax arrears that need to be paid. If you don't want to pay, they might try to negotiate with you," said Alfons on Thursday.
To convince their victims, these fake tax officials might disclose detailed taxpayer information obtained through the data leak. Therefore, Alfons advised the public to verify the authenticity of such claims by contacting the official tax office.
In the Breach Forum post, Bjorka also claimed that the leaked data includes information belonging to high-profile government officials, including Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati, Communications and Informatics Minister Budi Arie Setiadi, SOEs Minister Erick Thohir, Coordinating Minister for Human Development and Cultural Affairs Muhadjir Effendy, Religious Affairs Minister Yaqut Cholil Qoumas, Trade Minister Zulkifli Hasan, and Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Airlangga Hartarto.
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