9th Biennial ACSPRI Social Science Methodology Conference

Indonesia is one of Southeast Asia largest countries and it faces significant cyber threats, and yet issues relating to cyber security in Indonesia are still under explored. The purpose of my research is to investigate how Indonesia securitises cyber security threats, exploring this through the post-Copenhagen School (CS) of securitisation. Post-CS securitisation was selected, not only because this approach emphasises the speech act conducted by the securitising actor, but it also provides room for analysis on the audience’s response in the securitisation process. Securitisation is created by a speech act, a discursive practice that labels an issue as a security threat, thereby legitimising extraordinary measures being taken to address it. Through a social and political lens, cyber security can be viewed as a holistic response to the security challenges posed by information technologies, that have vulnerabilities to threats that are not entirely preventable and are unpredictable in nature. Therefore, cyber security allows for the minimisation of risk posed by threats across information and communication technologies
My research aims to answer the question of how cyber has been securitised in Indonesia between 2019-2024. A key method used to help answer this question is discourse analysis. Discourse analysis focuses on the interpretation of linguistic forms of communication, spoken or written and can include both official and unofficial forms of communication within a social context that contributes to representation and meaning. The speech act theory of securitisation relies heavily on tools of discourse analysis to make claims about how actors use discourse to securitise an issue, or to frame an issue in security terms to allow for stronger policy interventions. It sees the language as performing roles that go beyond describing material reality and sees language as playing an important role in structuring an action. Furthermore, discourse analysis it enables exploration of how speech acts are capable of securitising cyber threats from the perspectives of the securitising actor and the audience. The securitising actor in this sense is the government and the audience is the citizen where the government is undertaking the securitisation.
The application of the research methods used in this research consists of data collection, from law, bills, amendments, speeches and contributions of related officials, regulations, recommendations, press releases, press conferences, interviews, lectures, conference presentations, articles, books and other relevant documents to cyber security issues in Indonesia between 2019 and2024. These documents are drawn from both the government and the audience The research then moves to content and document analysis, by using NVivo software for categorising text and analysing the frequency of different phrases and sentiment through coding. The aim of the analysis is to answer the research questions by exploring the relevant text, conducting categorisation, narrowing through contextual analysis and content structuring/theme analysis according to the theoretical framework. The analytical unit focuses on cyber security, cyber threats, cybercrime, data privacy, data protection, data security, and critical infrastructure. The results will then be analysed through the post-CS securitisation framework to understand how the cyber securitisation discourse evolved between the government and its citizens in terms of securing cyber from 2019 to2024. It is expected that the results of my research will contribute to explaining the relationship between these two actors to inform more effective and contextually relevant cyber security policies in Indonesia for the future.