The Supreme Court transferred to itself all cases pending before HCs relating to web content regulation.
The Centre informed the Court that the entire process of finalising the laws on regulating social media will be completed by January 2020.
What is the case on?
The Centre’s new draft of Intermediary Guidelines, originally issued in 2011, was made public last year, and comments invited from all sections.
The government will have to collate and analyse the suggestions and comments received.
It will then have to notify “extant rules” for effective regulation of internet intermediaries.
[Internet intermediary refers to a company that facilitates the use of the Internet - Internet service providers (ISPs), search engines, social media platforms.]
The Centre informed the Court that it would take another 3 months for the above process and complete it by January 2020.
This comes after the Supreme Court’s query on the status of the changes being contemplated in rules to ensure accountability of intermediaries.
The Court posed the question when it was hearing a plea by Facebook. Click here to know more.
The petition urged the Court to transfer to itself certain petitions filed in various High Courts for linking social media accounts to Aadhaar numbers.
What is the need for regulation?
There is an enormous rise in the number of people using the Internet and social media.
There is also an exponential rise in hate speech, fake news, anti-national activities, defamatory postings, and other unlawful activities using Internet/social media platforms.
The Internet has emerged as a potent tool to cause unimaginable disruption to the democratic polity.
The Centre took note of this growing threat by social media platforms to individual rights and nation’s integrity, sovereignty, and security.
Internet service providers also expressed concerns over unregulated functioning of Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.
What are the challenges in the process?
It is for the executive to frame policy on this sensitive matter.
On the other hand, the question whether social media need weeding out of objectionable content will ultimately require adjudication by the court.
The provisions on the mandatory disclosure of “originators” of offending messages are a source of worry to social media platforms that use end-to-end encryption.
Whether it is technologically feasible for the platforms to provide back-door access to law enforcement is uncertain.
Besides, balancing between requiring access to the originators of encrypted content and respecting individual privacy will be a huge challenge.
It is also a unique opportunity to test the impact of the K.S. Puttaswamy verdict (2017) on the proposed legal framework.
