New Delhi:
Shortly soon after Twitter permanently banned Donald Trump from applying its services, the outgoing American president has identified a pocket of help from uncommon quarters – Indian politicians.
All by means of Saturday functionaries and lawmakers, especially from the ruling BJP, commented on the rationale behind the ban. One such individual was Tejasvi Surya, a BJP MP who heads the party’s youth wing and, importantly, is a member of the parliamentary panel on Information Technology.
Social media platforms like Facebook, which have monopolies more than content sharing, have been offered “rights to alter our rights”, Mr Surya told TheSpuzz Saturday evening. He stated that though the combined user base of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp – more than 80 crore – was more than any news channel, the algorithms used to determine posts violating protected viewing policies “have a bias”.
“Twitter may say he has violated certain norms but my concern is all tech giants have such big monopolies of information broadcasting (and) have biased algorithms. Why are we giving them rights to alter our rights? This is the big question democracies must answer,” he stated.
“Why are we allowing ‘intermediaries’, which by law must not deal with content, the right to monitor or alter depending on their algorithms? This must be discussed among democracies across world because this poses a serious threat to fair and free elections,” Mr Surya added.
Debate on the freedom of expression on social media created headlines about the globe this week soon after Twitter and Facebook announced a permanent ban on President Trump’s accounts soon after concluding he had incited the violence at the Capitol constructing on Wednesday evening.
Facebook cited his “use of our platform to incite violent insurrection against a democratically-elected government.” Twitter, which has deleted tweets with allegations about the US election, stated it had “permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence”.
The bans have invited praise and censure in equally furious measures, with critics of the President welcoming the move and supporters arguing it violates Trump’s ideal to freedom of speech.
In India the debate has focused on permitting hate speech to circulate on line. Last month there was controversy soon after Facebook stated there was no bring about to act against the Bajrang Dal – a ideal-wing group with ties to the ruling BJP – in spite of it becoming tagged as supporting violence against minorities.
Also in India Facebook has been accused of not applying hate speech guidelines uniformly.
Speaking to TheSpuzz Mr Surya stated social media platforms had been barred from altering, monitoring or altering content for the reason that they had been viewed as “intermediaries” beneath Section 79 of the IT Act.
Under such laws, he stated, social media platforms did not have authority to take away content. If they want to do so, then they will have to count themselves as media platforms and be held accountable accordingly. “They must not whimsically (and) based on algorithms remove content,” he added.
Mr Surya also referred to Section 69 of the IT Act that outlines provisions for reporting of hate speech or illegal activity to the authorities, who can then ask the platform to take action.
“Unless there is a regulator – a state authority – which can decide if something is hate speech or not, and then take action, this is going to be dangerous… we’re letting these platforms decide what is right or wrong,” he argued.
Earlier Saturday Mr Surya flagged the Trump ban, calling it a “wake up call for democracies” and saying: “If they can do this to POTUS (President of The United States), they can do this to anyone.”