If these social media platforms fail to accept govt guidelines, they risk losing status as social media platforms and protections as intermediaries. Government can also take action against them as per the law of the land for not following the rules
Social media giants like
Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Instagram may face a ban in India if they fail to
comply with the new intermediary guidelines for social media platforms. The
three-month deadline given by the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology
(MEITy) to accept these guidelines ends today i.e. May 25 but none of the
giants have so far accepted the new regulations. The rules will be effective
from tomorrow despite these companies seeking a total six-month delay in their
implementation.
Homegrown
social media platform Koo, which is the Indian version of Twitter, is the only platform that has so far accepted the Centre's intermediary guidelines.
If any of these social media platforms fail to accept these
guidelines, they risk losing status as social media platforms and protections
as intermediaries. The government can also take action against them as per the
law of the land for not following the rules, a government official said.
Meanwhile,
Facebook has indicated that it'll comply with the IT rules. "We aim to
comply with the provisions of the IT rules and continue to discuss a few of the
issues which need more engagement with the government. According to the IT
rules, we are working to implement operational processes and improve
efficiencies. Facebook remains committed to people's ability to freely and
safely express themselves on our platform," an official spokesperson of
the company said in a statement.
The new rules were announced in February which requires large
social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp to follow
additional due diligence, including the appointment of a chief compliance officer,
nodal contact person and resident grievance officer.
Appointment
of a grievance officer would be a key requirement from day one of rules coming
into effect, given the importance of public interface for complaints, and need
for an acknowledgment system for requests, suggest officials.
On February 25, the government had announced tighter regulations
for social media firms, requiring them to remove any content flagged by
authorities within 36 hours and setting up a robust complaint redressal
mechanism with an officer being based in the country.
The government had set 50 lakh registered users as the threshold for defining
'significant social media intermediary', meaning that large players like
Twitter, Facebook, and Google would have to comply with additional norms.
Announcing the guidelines in February, it had said the new rules take effect
immediately, while significant social media providers (based on the number of
users) will get three months before they need to start complying.
Significant social media companies will also have to publish a
monthly compliance report disclosing details of complaints received and action
taken, as also details of contents removed proactively. They will also be
required to have a physical contact address in India published on its website
or mobile app, or both.
As per data cited by the government, India has 53 crores WhatsApp users,
44.8 crore YouTube users, 41 crore Facebook subscribers, 21 crores Instagram
clients, while 1.75 crore account holders are on the microblogging platform
Twitter. Koo has close to 60 lakh users, making it a major social media
intermediary under the new guidelines.
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