Legal Literacy - This article discusses the controversy regarding the DJPb's Nindy mascot, which is considered a result of "tracing art" or plagiarism by some Indonesian netizens. This controversy was eventually closed with an apology from the official DJPb Twitter account @haiDJPb.

This article also explains the concept of "tracing art" and how this can be considered a copyright infringement according to the Indonesian Copyright Law (UUHC). This article outlines that the duplication of a creation without permission from the copyright holder constitutes a violation of the creator's exclusive rights, including in the case of "tracing art". This article explains that the concept of copyright can be interpreted as "Right-to-Copy" or the right to duplicate, which is important to protect human creations in the fields of art and literature.

By: Angga Priancha

Controversy Tracing Art

Recently, the Directorate General of Treasury of the Ministry of Finance (DJPb) has been highlighted regarding the controversy of its mascot named Nindy, which is considered “Tracing Art.” Nindy is the mascot contact centre of DJPb, which is depicted as a two-dimensional female character with a style of Japanese animation illustration.

The problem is, a discourse has emerged among Indonesian netizens stating that Nindy is a result of plagiarism or tracing art from the work of others.

This controversy was eventually closed with an apology from the official DJPB Twitter account @haiDJPb, which stated: "MinHAI apologizes for the similarity of the Nindy character to other illustrations. Allow MinHAI to convey that the HAI DJPb contact center service upholds the originality of a work. Therefore, MinHAI apologizes and is committed to being more thorough in the future,"

Interestingly, in this controversy, the terminology “tracing art” is often mentioned, which can perhaps be interpreted in Indonesian as “menjiplak” (plagiarizing). This terminology is intuitively closely related to Copyright Infringement in the Indonesian Copyright Law (UUHC).

However, if read more carefully, the word “jiplak” (plagiarize) or “tracing art” is never written in the UUHC. The question is, how does the UUHC interpret the concept of “tracing art” as a copyright infringement?

Tracing art is an activity to follow the lines of a painting to be replicated on another medium. Conventionally, tracing art is usually done by placing tracing paper or semi-transparent paper to “trace” or following the lines and shapes of an existing image.

This activity is commonly carried out by students in kindergartens or elementary schools as a “tracing” activity. With semi-transparent paper, it is often referred to as “tracing paper.” However, of course, the tracing activities of students at school for educational purposes are different in context from “tracing art” as a violation that will be discussed in this article.