Earlier today, Twitter published rather an exhaustive weblog seemingly setting the record straight on almost everything it had performed to make sure its platform, accessed by hundreds of millions of folks about the globe, did not spread and amplify misinformation, in this case, about the ongoing farmers’ protest in India.
It was a meticulously worded weblog post, one exactly where Twitter also highlighted its duty to bear the torch for an open world-wide-web and no cost expression, when maintaining it protected from these engaged in propaganda, and peddling fake news. It was fighting a double fight. But then the government of India came up and referred to as it, uncommon. Here’s the complete story in 10 points.
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Following the reports of violence in current weeks, we’re sharing a granular update on our proactive efforts to enforce our guidelines and defend our principles in India: https://t.co/ry557Nj94U
Twitter confirmed in its weblog post that it had been asked by the government of India, on “several” separate occasions, to block an unspecified quantity of accounts/URLs/hashtags, more than the course of the final 10 days.
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) had handed more than a list of 257 URLs and one hashtag, followed by yet another directive to block 1,178 accounts for allegedly spreading misinformation on farmers’ protest. The government had invoked its energy beneath section 69A of the Information Technology Act to do this. Non-compliance would entail penal action.
Due to the “emergency” nature of two of these blocking orders, Twitter had withheld a number of accounts which includes Kisan Ekta Morcha which meant these accounts became inaccessible in India – although you could nonetheless access them outdoors of India. This was only short-term although, as Twitter went on to restore these accounts inside hours.
In the weblog post, Twitter stated, it “restored access to this content in a manner that we believe was consistent with Indian law.” Soon following, the platform was served with a non-compliance notice by the government.
Twitter has given that permanently suspended more than 500 accounts for violating its guidelines and withheld “a portion” of accounts flagged by MeitY for allegedly spreading misinformation on farmers’ protest. The latter, once more, falls beneath Twitter’s ‘Country Withheld Content’ policy and applies inside India only which indicates, withheld accounts will continue to be obtainable outdoors of India.
The cause why Twitter “withheld” these accounts was mainly because “we do not believe that the actions we have been directed to take are consistent with Indian law, and, in keeping with our principles of defending protected speech and freedom of expression, we have not taken any action on accounts that consist of news media entities, journalists, activists, and politicians. To do so, we believe, would violate their fundamental right to free expression under Indian law.”
“Twitter exists to empower voices to be heard, and we continue to make improvements to our service so that everyone — no matter their views or perspective — feels safe participating in the public conversation,” it stated.
Twitter additional stated it would continue to keep dialogue with the government of India and engage with them.
The government of India referred to as Twitter’s weblog post rather uncommon saying, “upon the request of Twitter seeking a meeting with the Govt., the Secretary IT was to engage with senior management of Twitter. In this light a blog post published prior to this engagement is unusual. Govt. will share its response soon.”
As a attainable repercussion to this response, more and more ministers from the cabinet have moved to what is getting referred to as India’s answer to Twitter for non-English customers, aka Koo, providing the Aatmanirbhar Bharat app a large shot in the arm. Koo, which was launched in March 2020, had won the government’s app innovation challenge in social category final year.