IT rules won't choke freedom of speech, privacy stays guarded: Centre
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New Delhi: The Union government said the new IT rules are consistent with the right to freedom of speech and expression guaranteed by the Constitution and do not put additional obligations on users, PTI reported.
On Monday, releasing a set of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) regarding the intermediary guidelines, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology said that though there will be attempts to identify the first originator of messages, the privacy of individuals will not be violated.
The FAQs addressed queries that online users have about the scope of new IT rules, major changes it brings over past provisions, how it enhances women and children's safety, and due diligence to be done by an intermediary, among others.
The ministry said the rules define "social media intermediary" as an intermediary that solely enables online interaction and allows users to create, upload, share, disseminate, modify or access information using its services.
Also, the ministry explained that any intermediary that enables commercial or business-oriented transactions providing access to Internet or search-engine services, e-mail service or online storage service, etc., will not qualify as a social media intermediary.
Ministry said that detection of the first originator of a message is not intended to compromise the end-to-end encryption system but to find the registration details of the originator. The detection is done based on the "hash value" of the encrypted message.
IT rules mandate the removal of any content flagged by authorities within 36 hours, and platforms should set up a robust complaint redressal mechanism with an officer based in the country.
Posts depicting nudity or morphed photos should be taken down within 24 hours of receiving a complaint. Platforms with more than 50 Lakh users must publish a monthly compliance report disclosing the details of complaints received, action taken and contents removed.
The Ministry said that offering the opportunity to interact with unknown users and enabling virality of content by facilitating sharing would mean allowing online interaction. Ministry would bring out the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) around IT rules and intermediary norms that would contain details of the appropriate agencies who will have the authority to issue takedown notices to platforms.
IT norms would increase netizens' safety and ensure the platform's accountability through a robust grievance redressal mechanism. It will check cyber threats, harassment and unlawful content.
It mandates that the chief compliance officer and the nodal contact person cannot be the same while the same person may perform the roles of the nodal contact person and the resident grievance officer. A parent SSMI (Significant Social Media Intermediary) can appoint common officers across its services, but contact details of these officers are required to be mentioned in each of those services.