After the attempt to pressure Twitter to take down accounts it deemed incendiary, the Indian government has issued on Thursday strict new rules of social media law not only for tweeting but also for Facebook and other socials media platforms.
India Imposes Stricter Social Media Law
According to CNN, the social media law imposed by the government of India requires any social media company to create three roles when establishing in the country. First, is a compliance officer who will ensure that they follow local laws; second, is a grievance officer who will be addressing complaints from users in the country regarding their platforms; and third, is a contact person, who must be available to the Indian law enforcement 24/7.
Aside from the three additional required positions, any social media platform or company will also have to publish a compliance report on a monthly basis, which details the volume of complaints that they are receiving and what actions they took.
In addition, the Social media platforms will also be required in banning numerous contents like posts which feature full or partial nudity, impersonating including morphed images, and a sexual act.
On the statement of the government, they have mentioned that the huge social networks, which will be soon defined by India according to the number of its users, will be given three months to comply with the policy changes, while smaller platforms are expected to comply as soon as possible.
Moreover, the new set of rules came on the heels of a tense standoff between the Indian government and Twitter. The social media platform reinstated numerous accounts that the government had ordered to take down for using what it called incendiary and baseless hashtags that relate to farmers, who are protesting against new agricultural reforms.
Twitter followed the orders of the Indian government in taking hundreds of accounts and partially restricted some of the accounts, but they just drew a line by refusing to block several accounts of activists, journalists, and politicians.
Also, some experts stated that the rules signal a greater willingness by countries worldwide to rein in big tech firms just like Facebook, Twitter, and Google that governments fear has become too powerful with lesser accountability, Financial Times reported.
The minister for electronics and information technology of India, Ravi Shankar Prasad shared on Thursday that social media is welcome to do business in the Indian territory, in fact, they have done exceedingly well, as they have brought good business, they did not only brought good numbers of users nationwide but also have empowered ordinary Indian citizens. He also added that while the Indian government welcomes criticism and the right to dissent, on the part of the tech companies, they need also to do more, against the abuse and misuse of social media.
Based on the statement of the spokesperson of Facebook, the company is currently reviewing carefully the new set of rules. They emphasized that they have always been clear as a company that they welcome regulations that set guidelines in order to address the toughest challenges on today's internet.
The spokesperson also mentioned that their company is an ally for India and the agenda about the social media law and the safety and security of the users is a critical one for their platform, Quartz India reported.
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