IT ministry asks social media cos to take away extra posts, alleges content material ‘spreading misinformation’ about Covid-19

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) on Sunday requested social media platforms comparable to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and others to take away about 100 posts and a few content material that it alleged have been “unrelated, old and out of the context images or visuals, communally sensitive posts and misinformation about COVID19 protocols”, sources within the IT ministry stated.
“When the entire country is putting up a brave fight against Covid-19 pandemic, some people are misusing social media to create panic. The ministry has asked these URLs (uniform resource locator) to be removed to prevent obstructions in fight against the pandemic and escalation of public order due to these posts,” a senior IT ministry supply stated.

The newest communication was despatched by MeitY was primarily based on suggestions of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), which flagged these URLs as “communally sensitive”.

Defending its newest elimination discover despatched to the social media platform, senior officers within the ministry stated that whereas social media might and was getting used to criticise the federal government, search assist and even supply ideas on dealing with of Covid-19 pandemic, it was additionally “necessary to take action against those users who are misusing social media during this grave humanitarian crisis for unethical purposes”.
The motion by MeitY comes a day after Twitter reported it had taken down or restricted entry to over 50 tweets flagged by the Central authorities, by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology up to now one month.
The international micro-blogging platform had submitted this data to the Lumen Database, an impartial analysis venture which research stop and desist letters surrounding on-line content material.
As per the data submitted by Twitter on the Lumen Database, a number of the URLs whose entry has now been blocked in India, contained details about the second wave of Covid-19 pandemic and have been important of the federal government’s dealing with of the identical. Some different posts and URLs, however, confirmed photos and movies of the latest Maoist ambush in Chattisgarh that left as many as 22 police personnel useless.
The tweets have been despatched by a journalist with a number one day by day, a filmmaker, a Member of Parliament, a Member of Legislative Assembly, and an actor. All these tweets have been withheld in India, which signifies that Twitter customers within the nation wouldn’t have the ability to view their content material.

Earlier this 12 months, in January and February, Twitter had been within the crosshairs of the IT Ministry after the social media large had initially refused to take down sure tweets about farmer protests flagged by the ministry.
Twitter had then sought to clarify its stand on why it didn’t take away sure tweets regardless of being requested by the ministry. The defiance of presidency orders, nevertheless, didn’t sit properly with the IT Ministry, which threatened to jail Twitter India workers if the platform didn’t act. Twitter India backed down, and later stated it had complied with 95 per cent of requests that the federal government had made.
The first checklist of 257 such accounts was despatched by the ministry on January 31, which was adopted by one other checklist of almost 1,200 accounts. Both lists despatched by the IT Ministry claimed that these Twitter handles had been “spreading misinformation” concerning the farmers’ protest, which had the potential to “lead to imminent violence affecting public order situation in the country”.
Twitter had responded by blocking a number of the accounts, however had later unblocked them — a choice which irked the IT ministry.

The platform has a number of occasions stated that it opinions every such take-down report from the federal government “as expeditiously as possible”, and takes applicable motion in keeping with the basic values of the corporate and its “commitment to protecting the public conversation”.