Digital India Bill and Fact-checking Unit

What’s in today’s article?

• Why in News?
• About the Digital India Bill
• Key Provisions of the Digital India Bill
• The Fact-checking Unit

 

Why in News?

• Online fact-checking platforms could be required to obtain a registration from the Centre, as part of a government plan to seek greater accountability from them.
• The measure is currently being considered as a key provision under the upcoming Digital India Bill, successor to India’s core Internet law.

 

About the Digital India Bill:

• It is a key component of a “comprehensive legal framework” that the government is preparing for the online space.
• It will subsume the Information Technology Act 2020, which according to experts and government officials needs a revamp owing to changing internet scenarios.
• The proposed bill, alongside the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Bill 2022 and the Indian Telecommunication Bill 2022, will contribute to the evolving framework on regulation, consumer rights and innovation.
• Once finalised (draft could be released soon), the Bill will impact Big Tech companies like Google, Amazon, Meta, Amazon and Apple, among others.

 

Key Provisions of the Digital India Bill:

• A departure from the long-held understanding of ‘intermediaries’ on the Internet - sites that typically act as a platform for users to access services on the Internet.
  • Present Scenario: Under the IT Act 2000, there is no classification of intermediaries.
  • Proposal: Intermediaries will be classified as social media platforms, e-commerce platforms, AI platforms, fact-checking platforms, etc., to prescribe specific rules to different types of intermediaries.
• New Regulator for Internet: On the lines of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) or the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
• Other provisions:
  • The IT Ministry could classify deliberate misinformation, doxxing, impersonation, identity theft, catfishing, and cyberbullying of children as offences under the new Bill.
  • The Bill may also change some of the fundamental rules that presently apply to internet platforms, such as safe harbour norms.
  • Penal provisions for violations and user harms related to emerging technologies, including generative AI platforms like ChatGPT and Google’s Bard, will also be addressed in the Bill.

 

The Fact-checking Unit:

• Earlier proposal:
  • The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) 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 IT (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) 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.
• Recent proposal:
  • Online fact-checking platforms could be required to obtain a registration from the Centre.
  • The registration plan could be carried out in phases, with fact-checking units of legacy and reputed media companies being allowed to seek registration in the first phase.
  • There is also a plan to not register ‘non-legacy’ fact checking bodies.

The government is also in conversation with the industry to develop a self-regulatory organisation for fact-checking information which does not relate to the government.

 

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Q1) What is the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Bill 2022?

The purpose of the Bill is to “provide for the processing of digital personal data in a manner that recognises both the right of individuals to protect their personal data and the need to process personal data for lawful purposes.

 

Q2) What is Bard?

Bard is a conversational generative artificial intelligence chatbot developed by Google, based initially on the LaMDA family of large language models and later the PaLM LLM.

 

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Source: Online fact-checkers may need to register with Govt: Bill on table