<![CDATA[The rapid growth of Islamic content on digital media raises a fundamental question of who holds the authority to determine the propriety of a religious message before it is disseminated to the public. Without an adequate validation mechanism, digital spaces risk being filled with content that deviates from basic Islamic principles yet still gains wide acceptance due to algorithmic and popularity-driven factors. This study aims to analyze the basis of religious authority underlying the legitimacy of the Institution for the Verification of Islamic Books and Content (LPBKI) of the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) and to examine the gatekeeping mechanism it performs in supporting the digital da'wah ecosystem. This research employs a qualitative approach through document analysis of LPBKI MUI's official publications and academic literature on religious authority and communication gatekeeping theory. Drawing on Max Weber's typology of authority, this study finds that LPBKI MUI's legitimacy is built through a combination of traditional authority rooted in the scholarly lineage of its verifiers, legal-rational authority grounded in its institutional structure and the legal basis of Law Number 3 of 2017, and a collective charismatic authority attached to the ulama figures within its board of advisors. Within the gatekeeping theory framework, LPBKI MUI applies four content-filtering standards: basic Islamic standards, Islamic-and-national-outlook standards, statutory regulation standards, and technical-linguistic standards. The study further finds that LPBKI's gatekeeping model remains manual and pre-publication in nature, in contrast to the real-time, post-publication character of digital information flows, leaving structural limitations in keeping pace with the continuously growing volume of content. This study recommends developing a validation mechanism that is more adaptive to the speed of the digital ecosystem without diminishing the scholarly-authority framework underlying its legitimacy.]]>
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