Indonesia plans copyright rewrite to rein in Google and AI platforms

Indonesia moved to rewrite its copyright law with rules that would grant copyright privileges to people who use artificial intelligence to help generate content, while also pressuring Google, Meta and other platforms to pay for news and creative work used by AI systems. The draft would overhaul Law No. 28 of 2014, the country’s current copyright regime, and put one of Southeast Asia’s biggest digital markets at the center of a global fight over who gets paid when machines learn from human-made material.

A June 22 legal summary said the Indonesian government had formally tabled the draft bill in the House of Representatives, or DPR, laying the groundwork for a broad update to copyright rules that have been widely viewed as overdue for reform. Industry summaries of the proposal say it could require tech platforms to compensate news publishers for AI training or content use, a change that would reach beyond simple copyright registration and into the economics of search, licensing and online distribution.

The practical effect for Google and similar companies could be substantial. If the bill advances in its current form, platforms may need to strike more licensing deals, change how they source training data, and rethink how they build products that summarize or repurpose news and other copyrighted material. The draft has also been described as carrying stronger penalties, including possible permit or licensing consequences, for platforms that do not comply with compensation rules.

Indonesia’s move comes as governments increasingly test how existing media and copyright laws apply to AI. Germany’s media regulator has already said Google’s AI Overviews fall under German media law, a sign that search products are being pulled into national rules designed for publishers, not model builders. That trend is now spreading beyond Europe and the United States, with Indonesia emerging as a notable test case in Asia.

Some reporting has described the Indonesian bill as the first in Southeast Asia to explicitly regulate AI in intellectual-property law. If lawmakers approve it, the rewrite would strengthen the hand of creators and publishers in Jakarta while forcing global platforms to decide whether to license content, alter product design or absorb higher compliance costs in a fast-growing digital market.