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The Indonesian Anti-Corruption Commission (KPK) has arrested the Rector of the University of Lampung for allegedly receiving IDR5 billion (US$336,000) in bribes from the families of students who failed the university entrance exams known as the autonomous admissions scheme. According to KPK, the ‘autonomous channel’ exam conducted by universities is vulnerable to bribery due to a lack of transparency and specific guidelines from the Ministry of Education, leaving state universities unsupervised.

Dagang Net Technologies Sdn Bhd has signed a memorandum of agreement with four universities in Indonesia to implement Dagang Net eScroll, a blockchain-powered web application for employers, graduates, universities and training providers to authenticate academic and training certificates. This application provides a unique signature and time-stamped certificate that can eliminate forgery, unlike traditional paper-based documents.

The National Police say more complaints have been lodged against higher education institutions that are alleged to have issued fake degrees since the Research and Technology and Higher Education Ministry filed a report against one such institution last month. The National Police’s detective division chief said that they were currently looking into reports from the Medan Police in North Sumatra which targeted the University of North Sumatra.

Research and technology and higher education minister said that he would soon publish the names of universities that were alleged to have issued fake diplomas. He said that he had set up a special team to investigate the case and would carry out impromptu visits to the suspected universities in the near future.

A graft watchdog in Indonesia has sounded a red alert for the education sector as it recorded some 40 cases of corruption in 2012, causing losses to the state of around Rp139 billion (US$14.4 million).

Anticorruption efforts are by no means a new concept in Indonesia. But since the 1950s, corruption has been mostly investigated and prosecuted, while preventative methods have been overlooked. A new collaboration involving more than 100 universities across the archipelago wants to change that.