Any foreigners in Indonesia who wish to check the status of their IMEI may contact DJBC directly instead.
On the X (formerly Twitter) account of the contact centre of the Directorate General of Customs and Excise, it was announced on 17th January that foreigners staying in Indonesia will not be able to check the status of their Temporary International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) online until further notice. Previously, the status of IMEI could be accessed and obtained via DJBC’s official online page: http://beacukai.go.id/cek-imei.html.
DJBC further explained that foreigners wishing to check the Temporary IMEI status of their mobile phone device could reach the contact centre of DJBC directly instead.
IMEI is an identification number attached to mobile phone devices. Most of them consist of 15 digits of numbers, though mobile phone devices with dual SIM-card features enforce two unique IMEI. Mobile phone owners in Indonesia are obligated to ensure that the attached IMEI is, indeed, registered in the database of the Ministry of Industry of Indonesia. This identification number is useful to track the whereabouts of the mobile phone device and prevent any threats of phone number hijacking.
In the case of foreigners visiting or residing in Indonesia for less than 90 days, two options are usually given: either they use a phone number as purchased in their respective home countries at the expense of international roaming-related costs or register their phone number at a nearby, local telecommunication operator (and not necessarily at a DJBC branch office) in exchange for an authorised IMEI.
For foreigners who wish to stay in Indonesia for more than 90 days, registration can be conducted via the online page provided by DJBC: https://www.beacukai.go.id/register-imei.html.
It should also be noted that, regardless of their duration of stay, any foreigner residing in Indonesia is only allowed to have as many as two unique phone numbers.