Government’s Perspective: IT Rules a Step Towards Denying Misinformation

Why in News?

Misinformation is a clear and present danger to the goal of safe and trusted internet. The immunity provided to intermediaries had become a hurdle to fixing accountability. The new IT rules are a step towards enforcing accountability without curbing the fundamental rights of citizens.

 

Government's 'Digital India' Campaign

• The PM launched Digital India in 2015.
• The objective of the campaign is to use the internet to bridge the distance between the government and citizens and to deliver responsive governance.

 

Evolution of the Internet after the Digital India Campaign

• Over the last nine years, the internet has made India the world's largest connected democracy.
• There are over 83 crore internet users in India at present.
• By 2025, India will achieve Universal Access which means every Indian will be on the internet.

 

Change in Internet Trends

• The presence of large platforms that have power over how users experience the web.
• Internet has become a platform for user harm, misinformation, and toxicity.

 

Impact of Spreading Misinformation on Internet

• Misinformation is not an outlier on the internet – rather, it’s being weaponised repeatedly against open democracies like India to create chaos.
• This poses internal security and national security risks.
• In recent times, Covid misinformation, fake cures, financial market misinformation and AI deep fakes have caused and will cause tremendous social and economic harm.

 

The use of social media platforms as a misinformation tool

• Social media platforms have been used by state and non-state actors:
  • To carry out misinformation operations for cyberwarfare.
  • To create civil unrest in society.
  • For radicalisation and terror recruitment.

 

How is India affected by misinformation on social media platforms

• In 2019, a network of accounts and pages managed from Pakistan were detected engaging in malicious, coordinated activity against India on social media platforms.
• More recently, The Washington Post exposed Khalistani elements using bots to conduct misinformation operations against the Indian government, including giving calls to violence.
• Misinformation is a great challenge and cannot be left unchecked, especially in India, because of the scale and diversity of its users ranging from children to the elderly.

 

Actions taken by India to curb misinformation

• On April 6, 2023, the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) notified the IT (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules 2023 to amend the IT Rules 2021.
• This amendment authorises the central government to designate a "fact check unit” to identify "fake or false or misleading" information in respect of "any business of the central government."

 

Criticism of new IT Rules 2023

• Do not define what constitutes "fake or false or misleading.
• These rules violate the Supreme Court's Shreya Singhal vs Union of India (2013) judgement, which laid down strict measures for blocking contents.
• They pose a challenge to Freedom of Speech. The government could flag any news or article that is critical to the government policies as fake, false, or misleading.

 

Government's explanations to criticism of new IT Rules:

• New rules are needed to fix the accountability
  • Protection granted to intermediaries under Section 79 of the IT Act, 2000 – Safe harbour was used to escape accountability and legal proceedings.
  • Recent studies also show that the reach of misinformation is risen exponentially greater than truthful content, some studies say almost by 20x.

• Why is this fact-checking unit a government body?
  • Since the government was a target of most misinformation operations, a government fact-checking unit was needed to flag misinformation.
  • Only the government has access to government data and so, it is almost impossible for any non-governmental entity to effectively fact-check content about the government.

• What would happen to the content being labelled false or misinformation?
  • Social media platforms can remove the labelled content or exercise the option to continue to host the disputed content.
  • If they choose the latter, the aggrieved department can dispute it legally in the courts as any principle of natural justice would and should permit.
  • There is already a grievance office and Grievance Appellate Committee (GAC) framework available to content posters to deal with their grievances.

• Do the new IT Rules pose a challenge to the Freedom of Speech? Government asserts that Rule 3(1)(n) of the new Rules explicitly provides that the fundamental rights of Indian citizens cannot be violated by any platform.

 

Concern around the world over misinformation

• Misinformation is being recognised by democracies as a challenge and all countries are struggling to create a framework to deal with it.
• The G20 Leaders Bali Declaration of 2022 highlighted the need to counter disinformation campaigns as an essential requirement to prevent online threats and promote cyber security.

 

Conclusion

The government says that its determined efforts to curb misinformation continue without ever diminishing Indian constitutional values and fundamental rights to ensure the internet never becomes a safe haven for those who seek to misuse it.

These rules represent a partnership between the government and social media platforms in keeping internet safe for all Indians.

 

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Q) What is cyber security?

A: Cyber security is the practice of defending computers, servers, mobile devices, electronic systems, networks, and data from malicious attacks.

 

Q) What is the objective of the Grievance Appellate Committee (GAC)? 

A: The GAC was one of the provisions in the recently amended Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021. GAC will look into user complaints regarding unsatisfactory grievance redressal by social media intermediaries.

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Source: The Indian Express