How Indonesian Working Holiday Makers Sort Fact from Hype Online

A journey that starts in the feed

The study was led by ADM+S Research Fellow Dr Udiana Dewi at The University of Sydney, based on fieldwork with Indonesian Working Holiday Makers across Australia. It looks at how migrants find, interpret and verify information as Australia's migration system changes, with policies, visa pathways and migration priorities continuing to shift.

According to the research, the path often begins on social media. A prospective migrant may come across a TikTok video or Instagram Reel about working in Australia. Comments and links lead to Telegram groups where people swap information on applications and preparation. Government websites become important as plans develop, while search engines and generative AI are used to search, summarise and clarify information. Migrants then check what they have found with peers and content creators. Closer to departure, destination-specific WhatsApp groups appear, and after arrival Facebook and WhatsApp communities become everyday sources on work, housing, transport and life in Australia.

These networks matter particularly for Working Holiday Makers, who have limited formal support structures and frequently move between jobs and regions.

Official information is there, but hard to use

Dr Dewi said official information is available, but "many migrants find it difficult to navigate and apply to everyday decisions." As a result, social media, influencers, AI and community groups have become part of an information infrastructure that makes migration information more accessible, although what circulates through these channels "is not always reliable," she said.

One participant put it this way: "The information from the Australian government is just too much… I tend to go to influencers instead. Sometimes they have already summarised everything into key points." The research describes influencers as translating complex information into familiar language and connecting it with lived experience, which gives content creators an important position in the migration information ecology.

The algorithm and the 'vicious cycle'

Participants distinguished between "humble" influencers, who shared the difficulties and uncertainties of migrant life alongside its opportunities, and "flexing" influencers, whose content focused on high salaries, branded goods, travel and lifestyle transformation. Some described the latter as "sugar-coated".

Content creators said the most responsible or realistic information is not necessarily what travels furthest. One participant called this a "vicious cycle": strong hooks attract engagement, engagement increases algorithmic recommendation and visibility, and visibility creates incentives to make more of the same. A creator gave an example of a misleading hook popular in Indonesia: "You can earn one billion rupiah a year working in Australia."

Dr Dewi said platform algorithms make highly engaging and unrealistic content more visible than realistic accounts of precarious working conditions and everyday struggles. The study links this to wider ADM+S work on recommendation systems as socio-technical systems, whose consequences emerge from interactions between algorithms, users, content, commercial incentives and context.

Seminar and workshop

The research was discussed at the Navigating Migration in the Digital Age seminar and workshop, co-hosted by ADM+S and the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre (SSEAC) at the University of Sydney on 18 September. Speakers included Professor Heather Horst and Associate Professor Jeffrey Neilson, who opened the event, and Salsabila, an Indonesian Working Holiday Maker and content creator. Raka Pamungkas, a PhD researcher with more than 13 years as an Indonesian foreign service officer, spoke on official information and digital government communication. Malina Grube of the Immigration Advice and Rights Centre (IARC) discussed access to reliable legal information and introduced IARC's Immigration Kit: Digital Edition.

A workshop with 57 participants, in person and online, included holidaymakers, community organisations, migrant support organisations in Queensland and New South Wales, and researchers from Australian universities. They mapped the sources of information, support and trust migrants rely on, identified where gaps and breakdowns occur, and considered how to build stronger connections through the digital and community infrastructures migrants already use.

What it means

The findings point to an opening for those who produce migration information: reaching migrants in the spaces they already use rather than expecting them to find official sources alone. Dr Dewi said the aim was to identify "practical ways to strengthen connections between the digital spaces migrants already use and reliable information, expertise, and support."