The Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules 2023

What’s in today’s article?

• Why in News?
• What’s in the IT Amendment Rules 2023?
• What are the Objectives behind these Amendments?
• What is the Proposal on the Fact Checking Unit?

Why in News?

• The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) released an amendment to the IT Rules 2021, to regulate online real money games where users have to risk money to play.

What’s in the IT Amendment Rules 2023?

For intermediaries, it is obligatory,

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• To avoid hosting, publishing, and sharing any online game that might be harmful to users and has not been approved by an online gaming self-regulatory authority.
• To make sure that no non-authorised online game’s advertisement is hosted on its platform.
• To refrain from publishing, disseminating or hosting fabricated, inaccurate or misleading information (as identified by the Fact Checking unit of the govt) about any Central Government business.
• Responsibilities of intermediaries in relation to online games involving real money:
  • Displaying of a mark of verification by the self-regulatory body;
  • Informing users of the policy for withdrawal or refund of deposit;
  • Obtaining the KYC details of the users;
  • Not giving credit or enabling financing by third parties to the users, etc.
• Multiple self-regulatory bodies that represent the online gambling sector and operate independently of their members may be notified by the government.
• These self-regulatory bodies –
  • Check and confirm that there are no bets or gambling elements to the online game.
  • Make sure the online game complies with legal requirements and standards, including safety precautions like parental controls.
• The obligations take effect when there are enough self-regulatory bodies established, so that the online gaming sector has enough time to comply.

What are the Objectives behind these Amendments?

• To make social media and online gaming intermediaries exercise more caution.
• To safeguard the security and confidence of the Digital Nagriks and offer them every chance to start businesses and develop.
• To ensure that India achieves its aim of having a $1 trillion digital economy by 2025–2026 by enabling the Indian online gaming industry to thrive and expand.

What is the Proposal on the Fact Checking Unit?

• The Ministry had previously suggested that news that has been deemed “fake” by the PIB’s fact-checking team will not be permitted on online intermediaries. The reference to PIB was dropped from the Amendment Rules 2023.
• The social media companies have submitted a proposal to the Center to establish the Misinformation Combat Alliance – a network of fact-checkers that will verify misleading content on their platforms.
  • The alliance will act as a “certification body” that will serve as a means of identifying “trusted” fact-checkers.

Q1) What are the IT Rules 2021?

India in 2021, replaced its decade-old regulations on social media intermediaries (SMIs) with the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021 that were primarily aimed at placing obligations on SMIs to ensure an open, safe and trusted internet.

Q2) How big is India’s digital economy?

India’s digital economy grew 2.4 times faster than the Indian economy (in 2021), with strong forward linkages to non-digital sectors; digital output multiplier has increased over time, highlighting the role of investments to drive growth and 62.4 million (11.6%) workers are employed in the digitally dependent economy.

Source: IT Ministry notifies body to flag ‘fake’ content about govt, PIB reference removed | TH | PIB