Fishers and maritime experts are calling on the federal government to rethink its "porous" northern border policy after a tragedy off the Kimberley coast earlier this year.
Nine Indonesian fishermen drowned when a freak wave capsized their boat in March near the Ashmore Reef.
Three survivors were picked up and taken to Darwin Hospital after spending nearly three days at sea.
The tragedy forced a spotlight on maritime border policy in northern Australian waters, as the Australian Border Force continued to record high numbers of incursions of Indonesian fishers throughout the pandemic.
The surviving men told the ABC economic conditions in their home of Rote had resulted in local fishers taking increased risks to earn a living, including fishing for lucrative sea cumbers in Australian waters during the monsoon season.
Commercial fisherman Grant Barker said he had seen the impact of Indonesia's crippled economy play out in Australia's northern waters while working around WA and the Northern Territory coast.
"It certainly tells me that they're desperate if they're willing to take that risk in the monsoon season," he said.
"Fishing in those waters from November till [April] is fraught.
He said it was OK for fishers with modern vessels.
"We know where the lows and when they form, and we can time our run back to port to get away from them," he said.
"These guys don't have that advantage."
Mr Barker said he believed a combination of the pandemic and border closures had prompted increasingly desperate commercial fishers to encroach on Australian waters.
He said the prevalence of COVID-19 in Indonesia had also contributed to a "hands-off" approach from border force, which only spurred illegal fishers on.
"They know that the federal government in Australia have had a 'softly softly' approach to border security over the last two years," Mr Barker said.
He said a reluctance to seize boats or take on passengers at sea meant the strongest consequence an illegal fisher could face was being turned back into Indonesian waters.
"It's been the stimulus to take it from a relatively small problem to a fairly serious one," Mr Barker said.
The number of incursions in Australian northern waters has skyrocketed in recent months, causing experts to heap pressure on the federal government to rethink how to approach the issue with Indonesia.
Joint working groups between the countries were established earlier this year, resulting in a public information campaign to help educate Indonesian fishers on where they could and couldn't fish.
But University of Western Australia adjunct professor Vivian Forbes, who studies maritime boundaries, said it was tough to tell traditional fishers where diplomatic borders existed.
"No matter what education program we give or pamphlets we produce, it doesn't really sink into the local fishermen," he said.
"I've seen them make paper planes of the maps we give them."
Dr Forbes said the perception the Australian government's policy was "soft" on Indonesian fishers was not strictly accurate.
"I don't think we have been really soft, but overall Australia has been very generous to the Indonesian fishermen, and for that matter, to the East Timorese," he said.
"We need to sit down with them and explain to them — these guys are fishing in [Australian] waters and we are at our limits as to how much border control and search and rescue we can do ourselves.
"We need to seriously get the two governments together and solve this problem … and make a solid line in the ocean."
Indonesian Institute president Ross Taylor said it was critical in developing maritime border policy that Australian authorities were mindful about the challenges the country had faced in recent years.
"I think we need to take a deep breath and say that whilst the so-called illegal fishing in our waters is of concern, sometimes we [Australia] takes a very focused and slightly arrogant view of the issue," he said.
"We're talking about people that earn approximately $5 a day – that's their life, that's their livelihood, they need to be able to fish."
Mr Taylor said from the Indonesian perspective, the "MOU box" in the Timor Sea needed to be reconsidered
The box, near Ashmore Reef where March's tragedy occurred, bans motorised boats of commercial fishermen and only allows traditional fishers.
"What is needed is a review of what we call the MOU box completely to allow perhaps restricted use of waters around Ashmore," he said.
"One of the options could be for Australia and Indonesia to form restricted licences to actually formally allow fishing under strict guidelines to continue rather than just have it on an ad hoc basis — so I think there's a lot we can actually do."
Mr Taylor said rather than a soft approach to maritime policy, he viewed the Australian approach as "ham-fisted".
He said a review of the MOU box could be a unique opportunity to encourage relations between the two countries.
"The only approach Australia has is to arrest the fishers, who are basically poor people who need to fish to sustain their families and then even worse, burn their boats — ensuring they have no livelihood at all," he said.
He said it was a contrary system that lacked sophistication.
"What Australia and Indonesia needs to do is to sit down to acknowledge that these people, particularly from Rote and villages there have been doing fishing for many, many centuries," he said.
"We need to look at the broader context of problems."
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade did not respond to specific questions from the ABC about whether there were any plans to review the MOU box or maritime borders.
A spokesman said they were having regular talks and "capacity building, information sharing and wider maritime cooperation".
A spokeswoman for Fisheries Minister Murray Watt said the government was committed to "considering a framework" in dealing with illegal fishing practices.
"The previous government took their eye off the ball in so many areas and it appears this was just another instance of that," she said.
