Fact check: no evidence Komdigi got Msbreewc's forest fire video taken down

Claim: A viral post by FreaKind Media said Indonesia's Ministry of Communication and Digital Affairs (Komdigi) is suspected of asking Pornhub, an adult video platform, to delete a video about the country's forest and land fires uploaded by content creator Msbreewc.

Verdict: Unproven. NewsWLD found no document, platform notice or official statement showing that Komdigi asked for the video to be removed. Komdigi has denied asking any platform to take down fire content, but it has not commented on this video specifically, and the platform has not publicly explained the removal.

What was claimed

Msbreewc, a content creator who posts on X as @bree_cov and on Instagram as @bree.cov, uploaded a video titled "INDONESIA Still BURNING" about the forest and land fires to an adult video platform. Posts on X reviewed by NewsWLD show the video being discussed from 7 November 2026.

In an X post published at about 01:04 WIB on 10 November 2026, the creator said the video was no longer up. She wrote that the platform checks every video before it goes live, so anything that breaks the rules would not have been published in the first place, and asked followers what that suggested. She did not name Komdigi in that post.

A post by FreaKind Media then went further, with the headline that forest fire content by Msbreewc had been blocked after going viral and that "KOMDIGI is suspected" of being the party that asked the platform to delete it. Other X users repeated the idea that Komdigi had the video taken down.

What we could and could not confirm

NewsWLD could not independently confirm the exact upload time or the removal. The platform is blocked in Indonesia and NewsWLD does not link to it. The evidence that the video went down rests on the creator's own post and on users' screenshots.

We searched Komdigi's statements and coverage by Kompas, Detik, CNN Indonesia, ANTARA and Suara for any reference to a request concerning this video. We found none. No outlet we checked had reported a Komdigi request, a platform notice citing a government order, or a statement from the platform about why the video was removed.

What Komdigi has said

Komdigi has repeatedly denied asking platforms to remove fire content, although it has not addressed this video by name.

On 21 October 2026, Minister of Communication and Digital Affairs Meutya Hafid said in a press statement, reported by Kompas and ANTARA: "There has been no takedown of content and no request for a takedown from Komdigi to restrict information about forest and land fires." She said information from the public was useful for the fire response and asked platforms to be transparent about their algorithms and community guidelines.

On 13 November 2026, Mediodecci Lustarini, secretary of Komdigi's Directorate General of Digital Space Supervision, said the ministry was ready to open its records and compare them with civil society data, according to Detik and Kompas. She said every takedown request is logged electronically and can be traced, and that Komdigi would correct any moderation mistakes.

Why the claim found an audience

The suspicion did not come from nowhere. In a release dated 12 November 2026, the digital rights groups SAFEnet and Remotivi said that of 127 moderated posts they had documented as of 8 November, 94 (74 percent) were moderated at Komdigi's request. They counted 13 posts about the fires, including posts on X, Instagram and Threads that received notices citing Komdigi requests.

Their list covers mainstream social media. The release does not mention any adult platform or this video. Komdigi said it could not yet match the 74 percent figure to its own records, according to Detik.

What platform and government records show

Komdigi's denials are about forest fire content. Records from platforms and the courts show that Komdigi does ask platforms to restrict other content, including journalism and criticism, and that these requests leave a visible trace.

• Komdigi's own description of the trace. On 13 November 2026, Komdigi official Mediodecci Lustarini said users on X receive a notice that their content was removed at Komdigi's request, and that Meta shows a label naming Komdigi when it restricts content, according to Detik. She said content without such a notice was not necessarily restricted by Komdigi.
• A news outlet's post, April 2026. When BBC News Indonesia tried to open a Magdalene post on an investigation into the acid attack on activist Andrie Yunus, it saw the message "Post not available in Indonesia. This is because we complied with a legal request from KOMDIGI to restrict this content", BBC News Indonesia reported. Komdigi's director general for digital space supervision, Alexander Sabar, said the block followed a public complaint that the content was disinformation and provocative, according to Kompas. The restriction was later lifted, Independen reported.
• An account tracking officials' luxury goods, June 2026. At the end of June 2026 the Instagram account @cabinetcouture_idn became unavailable in Indonesia with a notice that the restriction complied with a request from Komdigi, according to The Conversation Indonesia and Independen.
• Forest fire posts, October 2026. SAFEnet and Remotivi said three X posts about the fires, two criticising President Prabowo's response and one about the fire in Way Kambas National Park, received notices of alleged violations of Indonesian law at Komdigi's request, as did one Instagram post and one Threads post, as reported by Katadata. NewsWLD has not seen those notices independently. In September the groups had also reported that a Malaysian citizen's criticism of the Kalimantan fires was geoblocked in Indonesia at Komdigi's request, in a release published before the minister's denial.
• Meta's transparency data. Meta's Indonesia page, whose latest listed period is January to June 2026, says it restricted over 20 million items for alleged violations of local laws, mostly on gambling, including about 16,000 items based on reports submitted by Komdigi on illegal gambling and regulated goods, plus over 200 items on Threads, according to the Meta Transparency Center. The page gives totals, not individual posts, so it neither confirms nor rules out restrictions on fire content.
• Google's data. In Google's government removals dataset, Indonesian authorities filed 1,794 requests covering 20,190 items in January to June 2025, the latest period published; 19,084 of the items were filed as regulated goods and services, and none were filed under government criticism, according to NewsWLD's reading of the Google Transparency Report bulk file.

NewsWLD could not read the Lumen database's Indonesian notices, which require researcher access, or X's country figures, which did not load for us.

What Meta AI said, and why it is not evidence

Screenshots of Meta AI on Threads saying Instagram blocked accounts "because Meta follows legal requests from Komdigi" spread on 21 October 2026, CNN Indonesia reported. A chatbot's answer is not a company statement and can be wrong. Komdigi said the answers could not be treated as evidence and asked Meta for clarification, CNN Indonesia reported on 23 October. Katadata said on 12 November that neither Komdigi nor Meta had answered its questions on the findings. NewsWLD found no public statement from Meta.

Matching the data

Komdigi said on 13 November that it could not find the 94 cases in its own records by period and that the real figure "could be larger than that, or the reverse", according to CNN Indonesia. It also said, according to Katadata, it was preparing a public notification system for access cuts after a Constitutional Court ruling. The same official said the only content Komdigi can cut off directly is online gambling and pornography. SAFEnet and Remotivi invited Komdigi to a public test of the data on 17 November 2026, CNN Indonesia reported. As of publication, no joint result had been released.

None of these records mentions the adult platform or Msbreewc's video. NewsWLD checks the minister's broader denial in a separate fact check.

The platform's rules

Pornhub said in December 2020 that it had "an extensive team of human moderators dedicated to manually reviewing every single upload", as reported by Ars Technica. That supports the creator's point that videos are checked before publication. It does not show who asked for the removal, or whether anyone did. Platforms also remove content on their own initiative or after user reports. NewsWLD found no public statement from the platform about this video.

The legal background

Komdigi's predecessor, Kominfo, blocked Pornhub in Indonesia in 2017 for content that breaches decency under Article 27(1) of the Electronic Information and Transactions Law (UU ITE), according to CNN Indonesia.

Under Ministerial Regulation 5 of 2020, a private electronic system operator ordered by the minister to take down prohibited content must do so within 24 hours, or within 4 hours if the request is urgent. If it does not, the minister can order internet providers to block the service, according to the regulation text published by Komdigi. Because the platform was already blocked in Indonesia, the video was not officially accessible from Indonesia even before it was removed.

The fires themselves

The fires the video referred to are real and continuing. The National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) recorded 283 fire hotspots across several provinces as of 13 November 2026, with 764 hectares under active handling, and said burned land being handled in East Kalimantan rose 50 percent from the day before, according to Kompas.

Conclusion

The video appears to have been taken down, based on the creator's own account, but there is no public evidence that Komdigi asked for it. The ministry denies asking platforms to remove fire content and says its requests are logged and can be checked. Records from BBC News Indonesia, Kompas and civil society monitors show Komdigi does ask mainstream platforms to restrict content, including journalism and, according to SAFEnet and Remotivi, some posts about the fires, so the question is a fair one. Until the platform, Komdigi or a document shows otherwise, the claim that Komdigi was behind this removal remains unproven. NewsWLD will update this check if either side publishes new information.