Social media to face strict action over fake news: Ravi Shankar Prasad

New Delhi: The Indian government will take “strict action” against companies if social media is allowed to be misused for fanning violence, spreading fake news and creating disharmony in the country, union minister for electronics and IT Ravi Shankar Prasad told Parliament on Thursday.

India is open to criticism but strict action will be taken if companies do not control fake news — be it Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or WhatsApp, he said.

“You can work in India, have crores of followers, we respect that. You can earn money here but you will have to follow the government’s laws and India’s Constitution,” Prasad said in his first public comments following the government’s standoff with Twitter over blocking access to accounts that are allegedly spreading misinformation on the farmer protests on the microblogging platform that could be harmful.


It is not acceptable for the social media platforms to be trending hashtags supporting massacre and genocide, Prasad said.

‘Tighten Rules for Intermediaries’

The minister also said that the government is committed to freedom of media, rights of individuals and independence of judiciary completely. In his address, Prasad also called out companies that employ what he termed as “double standards”. “..when there is violence in US Capitol Hill, social media platforms stand by police investigation but when Red Fort is breached, the same platforms go against the Indian government? Red Fort is the symbol of our pride. We won’t allow these double standards,” the minister said.

In a blogpost on Wednesday, Twitter had said that it had not taken “any action” to suspend the accounts of news media entities, journalists, activists and politicians as it would violate “fundamental right to free expression under Indian law”.

However, the American company said that it had suspended close to 500 accounts and withheld others within India, following a request from the Centre.

Digital rights experts are of the view that now is an opportune time for the government to revise legal provisions that regulate intermediaries like Twitter and Facebook in order to make them more responsible.

‘Wakeup Call for Govt’

“The defect in the legal provisions has created more elbow room for the companies. It should be a wakeup call for the government,” said Pavan Duggal, who is a cyber expert and an advocate in the Supreme Court. “Intermediaries need to be made responsible for non-compliance with Indian laws and more accountable for the fake news and hate speech on their platforms,” Duggal said, while pointing out that “those rooting for freedom of speech can always go to the court and challenge the government order”. The draft of amendments to the Intermediary Liability Guidelines, which are still in the works, mandates social media companies to verify users through their mobile numbers. Even the proposed draft of the Personal Data Protection Bill contains a clause to verify the users.

The government in its statement on Wednesday had said that Twitter allows fake, unverified, anonymous and automated bot accounts to be operated on its platform, raising doubts about its commitment to transparency and healthy conversation.

‘Need to Verify Users’

NS Nappinai, Supreme Court advocate and founder of Cyber Saathi, said that user verification through mobile numbers can control cyber bullying and crime while also addressing the issue of bots and anonymous trolling, but it poses the danger of platforms acquiring even more personal information about users.

“(Social media) platforms need to come up with technological solutions to verify users and weed out fake accounts without having to collect more personal information about the users which can be misused,” he said.