Police find fake QRIS stickers at Jakarta mosques

They have so far arrested one individual connected to the case.

"We have taken police action against an individual with initials MIML (39) who made and placed the false QRIS stickers at several places," the police's director of special criminal investigation, Senior Commissioner Auliansyah Lubis, said at a press conference here on Tuesday.

The case came to light after a police report was filed on April 9, 2023, by the manager of Nurul Iman Mosque at Blok M Square, a mall in South Jakarta, who found a suspicious QRIS barcode sticker at the mosque, he informed.

"The informer is the mosque manager who found a QRIS sticker at a pillar at the mosque's entry. After seeing the sticker, the informer asked a mosque cleaner (the witness) who made the QRIS sticker, but the witness said he did not know," he said.

The mosque manager and the cleaner inspected the entire mosque premises and found 24 more false QRIS stickers.

"Afterward, the informer observed the CCTV, which showed suspect MIML pasting the false QRIS stickers," Lubis said.

The suspect pasted the fake QRIS stickers over the mosque's legitimate QRIS stickers, besides the existing QRIS stickers, or placed the fake barcode on an empty wall, he informed.

Through the false QR code stickers, the money that unsuspecting mosque-goers intended to donate to the mosque instead went to the owner of the false QRIS.

Lubis said that MIML is suspected of violating Article 28 Paragraph 1 of Law No. 19 of 2018 on Electronic Information and Transactions, which carries a six-year prison sentence or a maximum fine of Rp1 billion.  Related news: BRI seeks greater public vigil to avoid digital banking frauds