Jakarta Residents Fight Fake Images Plaguing Online Marketplace Thousands

A growing number of Jakarta consumers and small traders say the spread of duplicate and stolen product images on major e-commerce platforms is costing them money, eroding trust, and in some cases destroying small businesses built over years. The complaints, collected across several neighbourhoods this week, point to a problem that has quietly worsened as Indonesia's digital retail sector has expanded rapidly since 2023.

The issue sits at an uncomfortable intersection of two defining realities for the city right now: Jakarta's middle class is shopping online more than ever, and the regulatory architecture around digital commerce has not kept pace. Gojek and Tokopedia-both headquartered within the city's broader economic orbit-have each rolled out seller-verification programs, but community members say enforcement at the product-listing level remains inconsistent and slow.

Suara dari Lapangan: Penjual Kecil Paling Terdampak

In Tanah Abang, Jakarta Pusat, the country's largest wholesale textile market, vendors who have moved portions of their business onto digital platforms describe a specific pattern: a legitimate seller uploads original photographs of their batik or ready-to-wear garments, and within days the same images appear on dozens of competing listings, often paired with goods of inferior quality or at prices that cannot possibly reflect the same product. One cluster of traders near Blok A has begun watermarking all images with their stall registration codes-a workaround, not a solution.

In Cakung, East Jakarta, a district home to a dense concentration of small-to-medium manufacturing units, producers of household goods say stolen product photography has undermined relationships with buyers on Tokopedia and Shopee. Because duplicate images are indexed across multiple storefronts, a buyer searching for a specific item from a verified manufacturer can end up purchasing from an unrelated third party whose listing uses the original seller's photos. The buyer complains. The original seller's rating suffers. The third party disappears.

Community members in Kemang, South Jakarta-where a younger, more digitally fluent consumer base concentrates-describe the problem from the buyer's side. Purchasing decisions made on the basis of polished images sometimes result in products that bear no resemblance to the photograph. Several residents described returning items purchased through major platforms after discovering the listing image had been lifted directly from a foreign brand's website.

Data dan Upaya Platform

Indonesia's digital economy generated roughly Rp 5,500 trillion in gross merchandise value in 2025, according to figures cited by the Ministry of Communication and Digital Affairs. The sheer volume of transactions-and the corresponding volume of product listings, which on Tokopedia alone runs into the hundreds of millions-makes manual image-theft review almost impossible without automated detection tools. Both Tokopedia and Shopee have confirmed they operate image-matching systems, but neither has publicly disclosed the rate at which duplicate listings are successfully removed before a consumer completes a purchase.

The Badan Perlindungan Konsumen Nasional (BPKN), Indonesia's national consumer protection agency, received a reported 12,400 formal complaints related to e-commerce fraud in the first quarter of 2026 alone, a figure the agency has cited in its quarterly bulletin. Duplicate or misrepresented product imagery featured in a significant share of those cases, though BPKN has not published a precise breakdown by complaint category for that period.

Sellers operating under the Kementerian Koperasi dan UKM's UMKM digitisation programme-which has onboarded tens of thousands of micro-enterprises in Greater Jakarta since 2024-are particularly exposed. Many joined digital platforms with limited understanding of image rights or the technical steps needed to protect original photography.

For now, consumer advocates working with the Yayasan Lembaga Konsumen Indonesia (YLKI) in Menteng are advising buyers to cross-check product images using reverse-image search tools before completing purchases, and to file complaints directly through each platform's resolution centre rather than waiting for marketplace moderators to act. Sellers are urged to register original photographs with a digital timestamp through the Direktorat Jenderal Kekayaan Intelektual before uploading, a process that takes roughly three working days and provides a dated record that can support a takedown request. The practical advice is straightforward. The systemic fix is still waiting.