Indonesia’s Constitutional Court is examining whether telecommunications providers can lawfully expire unused prepaid internet quota, after civil-society group SAFEnet argued that such data retains economic value and enjoys constitutional protection as private property. In an amicus brief submitted in late July, SAFEnet pointed to Article 28H(4) of the 1945 constitution, contending that pre-paid data—like pre-purchased credit—remains under the user’s ownership irrespective of contractual classifications as a service or product. The court has signalled sympathy with that view: Justice Liliek Prisbawono Adi noted that “the remaining quota that has not been used still has economic value because the user has paid a sum of money to obtain service access in a certain volume.” Petitioners in the case report tangible losses: one prepaid user forfeited 23 GB in a single month, equivalent to roughly US$3–4.50, while a postpaid subscriber lost an average of 36 GB monthly despite settling bills in full.

Viewed from Tehran, the debate over digital rights intersects with infrastructure security. At a recent policy roundtable, digital rights specialist Milad Nouri described how attackers weaponise compromised user devices—ordinary smartphones—to flood domestic platforms with authentic-seeming requests, bypassing standard firewalls. Platforms such as Alibaba.ir, Zarinpal and Flytio have faced such distributed denial-of-service campaigns. Meanwhile, Hamed Beydi, a digital-rights expert, argued that heavy-handed internet filtering has proven counter-productive: widespread VPN use has rendered filtering ineffective, prompting authorities to resort to outright internet cuts. These shutdowns, Beydi added, deny servers critical security patches and amplify long-term technical and social insecurity rather than curbing it.

Separately, new consumer threats have surfaced. Russian lawmaker Anton Nemkin warned of a scam in which fraudsters impersonate marketplace employees, requesting SMS codes to supposedly cancel phony storage fees—codes that can unlock accounts or authorise fraudulent transactions. In Israel, the local Internet Association flagged an unusual wave of WhatsApp account blocks over the weekend, with dozens of users reporting loss of access without explanation. Meta acknowledged that its automated abuse-detection systems sometimes err, and said it works to restore accounts swiftly, while the association cautioned users against paying third parties claiming to reverse bans.

The next milestone to watch is the Indonesian Constitutional Court’s final ruling. A decision recognising unused data quota as protected property could compel operators across Southeast Asia to revise contract terms, setting a legal benchmark for digital consumer rights in the region.