Internet Censorship in India

Earlier this month we had reported about The Chief Justice of India's decision to shut down any obscene or pornographic websites online – this had also led to the shut down of famous desi pornographic toon site – savitabhabhi.com.

Now there has been another update to the IT law and according to which the government have dropped the power to block pornographic websites purely on the ground of obscenity.

This new update to the IT law is a welcome change as this would lead to the shut down of any website in India only if it violates basic state laws or intimidates people.

Shut down decisions now rest completely with the Judiciary (only courts) and an websites can only be shut down on the following 5 grounds:

• *overeignty and integrity of India
• defence of India
• security of the state
• friendly relations with foreign states and
• public order

Under the old provision, the government could ban websites to prevent incitement to the commission of any cognizable offense' including obscenity.

Taking into account the differing perceptions of what can be lascivious and prurient, the Bombay high court turned down a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking a blanket ban on websites with sexual content on the internet.

A public interest litigation (PIL) initiated by NGO Janhit Manch had sought a court direction to the Union government to ban freely available sexual content on the internet. The PIL stated that the pornographic and sexual content on the Net was adversely influencing the minds of the country's youth, who could be misled into delinquency.

According to Janhit Manch, the government had rightly banned an adult website, www.savitabhabhi.com,and must follow suit in the case of other pornographic and sexually explicit websites as well.

The judges, however, felt that they should not direct authorities to monitor websites. Their order said, If such an exercise is done, then an aggrieved party, depending on the sensibilities of persons whose views may differ on what is morally degrading or prurient, will be sitting in judgment even before a competent court decides the issue.

The court said Janhit Manch was free to lodge a complaint against any sites which, according to them, may be publishing or transmitting obscene content.

India's Supreme Court Chief Justice K. G. Balakrishnan has called for placing restrictions on websites circulating pornography and hate material, and justified the Central Government's action in the matter.

Addressing a seminar on Enforcement of Cyber Law here, Balakrishnan said the government initiative was the right step: They (websites) can also be used to circulate offensive content such as pornography, hate speech and defamatory material. In many cases the Intellectual Property rights of artists are violated by unauthorised circulations, he said.

He called upon monitoring agencies and the judiciary not to let gains of the IT (information technology) be an exploiting tool in society: It is the job of the legal system and regulatory agencies to make sure that newer technologies do not become tools of exploitation and harassment

India is considering drafting a new law to ban pornographic websites.

Minister of State for Home Ramesh Bagwe announced: We are thinking of introducing an act to ban pornographic websites. We will also request the Central government to amend the existing laws to make them more stringent.

He also police teams have begun patrolling cyber cafés to monitor downloading activities.

Draft rules proposed by the Indian government for intermediaries such as telecommunications companies, ISPs and blogging sites will amount to censorship.

Under the draft rules, such intermediaries will have to notify users of their services not to use, display, upload, publish, share or store a variety of content, for which the definition is very vague, and liable to misuse.

Content that is prohibited under these guidelines ranges from information that may harm minors in any way to content that is harmful, threatening, abusive.

Some of the terms are so vague that to stay on the right side of the law, intermediaries may in effect remove third-party content that is even mildly controversial, said Pavan Duggal, a cyberlaw consultant and advocate in India's Supreme Court.

According to the draft rules, an intermediary has to inform users that in case of non-compliance of its terms of use of the services and privacy policy, it has the right to immediately terminate the access rights of the users to its site. After finding out about infringing content, either on its own or through the authorities, the intermediary has to work with the user or owner of the information to remove access to the information.

The draft rules also add new provisions that appear designed to give the government easier access to content from intermediaries. Intermediaries will be required to provide information to authorized government agencies for investigative, protective, cybersecurity or intelligence activity, according to the rules.

The draft rules are secondary legislation framed by the government under the country's Information Technology (Amendment) Act of 2008. Under the IT Act, an intermediary is not liable for any third-party information, data, or communication link made available or hosted by him, if among other things, he has observed due diligence under the draft rules.

Update: XXX

30th March 2011. See article from economictimes.indiatimes.com

India will seek to block the internet's newly-formed red-light district after a global agency governing the web approved .xxx suffix for pornography websites last week, a senior government official said.

Last week, The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) approved .xxx suffix for pornography websites raising concerns from online pornography businesses and activists about a large scale arbitrary censorship by governments across the world who would now be able to easily identify porn sites because of the new nomenclature.

India along with many other countries from the Middle East and Indonesia opposed the grant of the domain in the first place, and we would proceed to block the whole domain, as it goes against the IT Act and Indian laws, said a senior official at the ministry of IT. Though some people have said that segregation is better, and some countries allow it. But for other nations transmission and direct distribution of such content goes against their moral and culture, he added.

April 2011 saw the enactment of Information technology Rules Act 2011 which introduce internet censorship to India.

The new repressive rules massively curtail freedom of internet speech and have left many offended as it destroys the internet as a platform of speech and beliefs.

The Act says that any statement that threatens the unity, integrity; defense, security or sovereignty of India, friendly relations with foreign states or public order is to be censored from the web. The act is very vague and is likely to invoke even more controversy in days ahead.

The new rules empower any official or private citizen to demand the removal of content that they consider objectionable on the basis of long list of criteria prepared by the information department.

The Department of Information Technology is empowered to block any site that displays any disparaging material. Article 19 of the Indian constitution allows for 'reasonable' restrictions. These restrictions have been used so far to ban books, movies on sensitive subjects like sex, politics and religion. India has also been famed for condemning speeches by famous personalities as seditious.

Cyber Cafes under Duress

See article from thenextweb.com

As part of India's Information Technology (Guidelines for Cyber Cafe') Rules, 2011, cyber cafe' owners are now required to make an effort to stop users from accessing pornographic or supposedly obscene websites.

According to The Times of India, cyber cafe's were notified on April 11th of a ruling requiring them to register with a government agency to ensure their adherence to the new guidelines.

In addition to monitoring porn, the new rules make it mandatory for Internet cafe' owners to install a filtering software and keep a log of all websites accessed by customers for at least one year. It also states that users will be required to present an identity card before being given access to a public computer. Additionally, building cubicles with a height of more than four and half feet will also be disallowed.

Cyber cafe' owners will be asked to give user logs to the registration agency every month.

Update: Vague Censorship of Free Speech

5th May 2011. See article from medianama.com

If there's a segment that indicates how poorly thought out India's finalized Internet control rules are, it is sub-rule 2 and 4 of the segment pertaining to Intermediaries in the country's finalized Information Technology rules.

Sub Rule 2 states that Users shall not host, display, upload, modify, publish, transmit, update or share any information that is grossly harmful, harassing, blasphemous, defamatory, obscene, pornographic, paedophilic, libellous, invasive of another's privacy, hateful, or racially, ethnically objectionable, disparaging, relating or encouraging money laundering or gambling, or otherwise unlawful in any manner whatever;

Additionally, Sub Rule 2 also states that users may not publish anything that threatens the unity, integrity, defence, security or sovereignty of India, friendly relations with foreign states, or or public order or causes incitement to the commission of any cognisable offence or prevents investigation of any offence or is insulting any other nation.

Sub rule 4 states that

(4) The intermediary, on whose computer system the information is stored or hosted or published, upon obtaining knowledge by itself or been brought to actual knowledge by an affected person in writing or through email signed with electronic signature about any such information as mentioned in sub-rule (2) above, shall act within thirty six hours and where applicable, work with user or owner of such information to disable such information that is in contravention of sub-rule (2). Further the intermediary shall preserve such information and associated records for at least ninety days for investigation purposes.

India's Department of Telecommunications has been asked to monitor Twitter and Facebook, because of fears that the sites are being used to plan terrorist attacks.

In April, the Indian Information Technology (IT) Act of 2008 was amended, giving officials the ability to monitor web activity. It also provides officials with access to private information, including passwords, without a court order.

However, Facebook and Twitter do not release the information of their users without a court order.

Indian film censors are saying enough is enough and want an end to excessive blood being shed in Telugu films. There is a feeling among censors that perhaps it could be shown as orange.

Film directors and producers are amused, enraged and are at their wits end as to how to get out of this bloody mess but the censor scissors are proving to be much sharper than the long swords and spears that heroes wield on screen.

The latest film to hurt the sensibilities of the censors is Rajanna. Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) chairperson Leela Samson has raised concerns over too much of violence in South Indian films, and taking a cue from her observations, board regional officer A Dhanalakshmi is clamping down on gory scenes.

The general instructions for Rajanna have been:

Delete the visuals of blood, slurring the whole screen, spilling, spurting, dropping, and dripping wherever it occurs in the movie. Delete the visuals of sword, spear or any weapon coming out from the other side of the body wherever it occurs.

According to sources, the war against blood by the censors began a few months ago with producers and directors being gently asked not to show so much of bloodshed on the screen. If it is inevitable, it is suggested that at least the red should be given a gentle orange hue. It is learnt that one film producer obliged and whenever he had to show blood, it was in orange colour.

Even as the controversy over Indian IT minister Kapil Sibal urging social networking sites to censor offensive content rages on, a trial court has directed several sites, including Facebook, Google, Orkut and Youtube, to remove anti-religious or anti-social content promoting hatred or communal disharmony.

Administrative civil judge Mukesh Kumar has directed the social networking sites to remove objectionable content in the form of photos, videos or text which might hurt religious sentiments. The court's order came on a civil suit filed by Mufti Aijaz Arshad Qasmi who had submitted a CD and printouts of the supposedly offensive contents.

The judge said:

The defendants (websites) are hereby restrained from publishing defamatory articles shown by the plaintiff and contained in the CD filed by the plaintiff immediately on service of this order and notice. Defendants are further directed to remove the same from the social networking sites.

The court has also issued summons to the sites and fixed the matter for hearing on December 24, 2011.

The Indian government has asked Internet companies and social media sites like Facebook to prescreen user content from India and to remove disparaging, inflammatory or defamatory content before it goes online, three executives in the information technology industry say.

Top officials from the Indian units of Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and Facebook are meeting with Kapil Sibal, India's acting telecommunications minister to discuss the issue.

About six weeks ago, Sibal called legal representatives from the top ISPs and Facebook into his New Delhi office, said an executives who was briefed on the meeting. At the meeting, Sibal showed attendees a Facebook page that maligned the Congress Party's president, Sonia Gandhi. This is unacceptable, he told attendees, the executive said, and he asked them to find a way to monitor what is posted on their sites.

In the second meeting with the same executives in late November, Sibal told them that he expected them to use human beings to screen content, not technology.

The executives said representatives from these companies will tell Sibal that his demand is impossible, given the volume of user-generated content coming from India, and that they cannot be responsible for determining what is and isn't defamatory or disparaging. If there's a law and there's a court order, we can follow up on it, said an executive from one of the companies attending the meeting. But these companies can't be in the business of deciding what is and isn't legal to post, he said.

Update: Mr Angry doesn't get his way

7th December 2011. See article from bbc.co.uk

Indian Communications Minister Kapil Sibal met officials from Google, Facebook and other websites and he was not a happy bunny.

He ludicrously wanted social media companies to implement the vetting of user content before it was published. He said the firms had told him they were unable to take action

He said the government would now introduce guidelines to ensure blasphemous material did not appear on internet.

Addressing a press conference Sibal said companies would not be allowed to say, we throw up our hands, we can't do anything about this. My aim is that insulting material never gets uploaded. We will evolve guidelines and mechanisms to deal with the issue. They will have to give us the data, where these images are being uploaded and who is doing it.

Before the press conference, Sibal showed reporters morphed photos of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi, as well as pigs running through Islam's holy city of Mecca.

Sibal's nonsense hasn't gone down well with social media users. The hashtag #IdiotKapilSibal is currently seeing a lot of chatter. No doubt he will want that censored too.

Update: Out of his depth comms minister backtracks on Facebook pre-censorship

11th December 2011. See article from timesofindia.indiatimes.com
See also article from zdnet.com

Indian Communications Minister Kapil Sibal has been on the receiving end of much international ridicule for his ludicrous suggestion requiring user content websites to pre-censor content before publication.

Google, owners of YouTube and Blogger, were forthright with their comments. In a statement issued by company spokesperson Google categorically said they will not censor content simply because it is controversial. The representative said:

We work really hard to make sure that people have as much access to information as possible, while also following the law. This means that when content is illegal, we abide by local law and take it down. And even where content is legal but breaks or violates our own terms and conditions we take that down too, once we have been notified about it, but when content is legal and does not violate our policies, we will not remove it just because it is controversial, as we believe that people's differing views, so long as they are legal, should be respected and protected.

Well now the beleaguered minister has back tracked on his proposal via denial. Sibal spoke on TV to NDTV:

There can be no pre-screening of content on the electronic media and on the social media... It would be madness to ask for it and I don't think any sane person would.

Meanwhile in Pakistan, defence minister A K Antony repsonded to Kapil Sibal's suggestion to censor social media platforms like Facebook, Orkut, Twitter and YouTube. He said the government had already given clarification that there was no such move.

Social media is a reality and has become the voice of young generation to express their feelings and opinion, and government would not curtail this freedom, he said, adding that social media is like any other media in the present world.

...BUT...the power of social media should not be misused and people should maintain some restraint in using the potential of social networking sites and Internet.

Offsite: I don't believe in censorship...but...

24th December 2011. See interview from week.manoramaonline.com

Surely a classic from the Indian communications minister, Kapil Sibal,  who is clearly floundering out of his depth.

Interviewer:  According to US media reports, these companies said you were trying to impose censorship [on social media websites].

Kapil Sibal: I have never said that the government will impose censorship...[BUT]...I have only requested them to pre-screen the material.

...Read the full interview

Update: Party political concern at India's corrupted youth

26th December 2011. See article from timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Kapil Sibal found an ally in Aditya Thackeray Aditya on censoring of social networking sites. At a press conference called by the political party Shiv Sena, Thackeray said government should put a mechanism in place to filter objectionable content in sites like Facebook.

A lot of objectionable material is available on these sites. They are corrupting our youngsters and posing a threat to our culture, he said.

Facebook, Microsoft, YouTube, Google, and 21 others have been issued summons by the court, on grounds of carrying objectionable content.

They have now been charged with section 292 (sale of obscene books etc), 293 (sale of obscene objects to young person etc) and 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code.

If these sites fail to clear derogatory content off their websites by February 6, 2012 they would be charged for contempt of court.

According to a statement from the court, the judge was deeply shocked by what he saw amongst the evidence presented to the court. Apparently unknown persons are selling, publicly exhibiting and have put into circulation obscene, lascivious content which also appears to the prurient interests and tends to deprave and corrupt the persons who are likely to read, see or hear it. Such as images of women kissing men.

It is also evident that such contents are continuously openly and freely available to everyone who is using the said network irrespective of their age and even the persons under the age of 18 years have full and uncensored access to such obscene contents, the court ruled.

It means that all the big names will either have to censor the internet or pull out of the lucrative Indian market. They are not likely to find much support from politicians either. The Indian government is furious that its citizens are apparently able to go onto the Internet and say nasty things about the Gandhi family.

Google India has filed a petition in the Delhi High Court saying that it does not exercise any control over content on YouTube, Google, Orkut or Blogspot in India, and thus can't be summoned to an Indian court in a criminal case against it related to inflammatory images of Gods and Goddesses posted on some of its websites.

The petition to quash a criminal complaint was submitted by Google India's lawyers in the Delhi High Court.

The original criminal complaint was filed by editor of Akbari, Vinay Rai last month. Google's India MD Rajan Anandan has been summoned to appear in a lower court on Friday in connection with this complaint.

According to the petition, Google India says that it has been appointed just as a distributor of Google Inc.'s Adwords program in India, and thus it's India MD does not control the Blogger, Google or YouTube websites. Google India furthur says that sites such as Orkut.com are owned by Google Inc, and thus it is not even an intermediary' as defined in the Indian IT Act, and thus can't be summoned to answer in any case regarding content.

Mukul Rohatgi, counsel for Google India, told ET that it's humanly impossible to monitor or remove the content before it is uploaded on the internet. My client Google India is different from Google Inc, and does not have any control over the platform. Google India is just an advertising and revenue collection body.

Appearing for Vinay Rai, his counsel SPM Tripathi said that according to IT Rules, 2011, the websites have to remove the content within 36 hours of receiving a court order, which they have not complied with. The content on the websites is derogatory against Hindu, Muslim and Christian Gods and Goddesses, and can spark a riot if publicised. It incites hatred and enmity between communities and thus should be removed by the parties.

Update: Delays in the case India v The Internet

20th January 2012. See article from zdnet.com

The Delhi High Court delayed hearings on petitions by Facebook and Google to dismiss criminal proceedings against them in the country's Web censorship case. The two Internet giants are among 21 companies that have been asked to develop a mechanism to block objectionable material in India, and the Indian government has given the green light for their prosecution.

Earlier this week, Facebook and Google told the Delhi High Court they cannot block offensive content that appears on their services. Although the case was originally filed in a lower court, the companies have appealed to the Delhi High Court, challenging the lower court's ruling asking them to take down some content. The high court has now pushed back the case till February 2, according to NDTV. If their petitions fail, the 21 companies will have to face trial in the lower court, which has its next hearing scheduled for March 13.

Google India has removed web pages deemed offensive to Indian political and religious leaders to comply with a court case that has raised censorship fears in the world's largest democracy.

A New Delhi court gave Facebook, Google, YouTube and Blogspot and other sites two weeks to present further plans for policing their networks, according to the Press Trust of India.

Google India did not say which sites were removed but had said it would be willing to go after anything that violated local law or its own standards.

Indian officials have been incensed by material insulting to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, ruling Congress party leader Sonia Gandhi and religious groups, including illustrations showing Singh and Gandhi in compromising positions and pigs running through Mecca, Islam's holiest city.

Communications Minister Sachin Pilot said that anyone hurt by online content should be able to seek legal redress, he said. The government has warned it has evidence to prosecute 21 sites for offenses of promoting enmity between classes and causing prejudice to national integration.

Update: Summons Stands

18th February 2012. See article from domain-b.com

The Delhi High Court has refused to stay a summons against Google and Facebook issued by a trial court over a private complaint. At the same time, Justice Suresh Kait denied a strong plea from the counsel for the Delhi Police that Google India managing director Rajan Anandan and Facebook India's director of online operations Kirthiga Reddy appear in person before the trial court on 13 March, when the next hearing is scheduled.

What is this insistence that they should appear in person? Justice Kait asked public prosecutor Naveen Sharma. They have been allowed to appear through a lawyer. The court deferred the hearing of the petition challenging their summonses to 3 May.

Sharma told the court that websites like Facebook and Yahoo had been given sufficient warnings and opportunities by the communications and information technology ministry to remove objectionable content before steps were taken for their prosecution.

Update: Removal Count

2nd March 2012. See article from webpronews.com

Presumably, Google has satisfied the request of the Indian courts as no more removal requests have been added to Google's Transparency Report although 122 more items have been added to the Items requested to be removed category. Additionally, only half of the removal requests have been fulfilled.

Update: Yahoo Excused

3rd March 2012. SSee article from bbc.co.uk

The Delhi High Court has dismissed a criminal case against Yahoo India which was accused of hosting objectionable content on its web pages.

Yahoo was among 21 web firms, including Facebook and Google, accused of hosting material that could cause communal unrest.

However Yahoo said there is no actual document to show that its website has violated any law.

The judge agreed, however, he said that a private complaint against the website could be revived if credible and actionable evidence was filed against it.

Update: Case Delayed

14th March 2012. See article from theregister.co.uk
 

The controversial Indian legal imbroglio over censorship of web content and involving twenty companies including Google, Facebook and Microsoft has been deferred until May 23.

An Indian court has ordered all of the country's ISPs to block 104 web sites that it claims offer illegal music downloads.

The Indian court's ruling came in the week that MPAA chairman and CEO Chris Dodd told the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry conference, We encourage the Indian film industry to reject as we have, the false argument that you cannot be pro-technology and pro-copyright at the same time.

The ISPs must block the web sites using both DNS and IP address blocking with deep packet inspection to reinforce the ban. Indian ISPs will implement the block by doing much more than just poisoning DNS servers, including IP address blocks and deep packet inspection (DPI). While DPI cannot see within SSH tunnels it can detect whether traffic is being tunnelled and can in theory drop it indiscriminately.

The Delhi Court has found blogger Jitender Bagga's blogs against Art of Living leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar to be defamatory and has ordered Google to take them down. Google complied with the order.

The complaint against the blogger is for content posted on his blog hosted on Blogpost (owned by Google) at revolutionprithvi.blogspot.in and srisriravishankarisguruorconman.blogspot.in. The directive by the High Court seemed to be another harsh ruling biased against the Internet and freedom of speech. However, if one looks at the websites listed in the complaint and the content, it does appear that Jitender Bagga was vindictive and has an axe to grind. Voicing ones opinion as form of art or literature is one thing, going hammer and tongs against someone in a malicious and resentful attack, is something completely different.

The Indian government needs to have qualified control over web content, Information & Broadcasting minister Ambika Soni has said.

Claiming that the government doesn't want censorship of social media, Soni justified the need for some sort of a mechanism for reasonable restrictions.

Some content is found to be inflammatory. That's why the government doesn't want to take chances, she spouted.

Sometimes, we need certain steps to maintain the unity and integrity of the country within such diversities, she added.

But Soni was quick to distance herself from Meenakshi Natarajan's Bill proposing curbs on the media. We believe in self-regulation, she claimed somewhat unconvincingly

The media wants to have the freedom to say or show anything, but is very averse to criticism, she added.