Delhi Police seeks details of handles that shared porn content on Twitter

On a May 29 complaint by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR), the cyber cell of the Delhi Police on Tuesday filed a case under sections of the Information Technology Act and Protection of Children from Sexual Offences(POCSO) Act against unidentified persons.

New Delhi: A day after a first information report(FIR) was registered over child sexual abuse and pornographic content on Twitter, the Delhi Police wrote to the micro-blogging site seeking details of the handles that uploaded or shared such material, officials privy to the development said on Wednesday.

In a statement on Tuesday, a spokesperson for Twitter said the micro-blogging site has a zero-tolerance policy for child sexual exploitation (CSE).(Reuters)

On a May 29 complaint by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights(NCPCR), the cyber cell of the Delhi Police on Tuesday filed a case under sections of the Information Technology Act and Protection of Children from Sexual Offences(POCSO) Act against unidentified persons.

“We have asked the social media company(Twitter) to help us in the investigation by sharing details of the identified handles, which shared the content. It is part of a routine procedure in cases related to cyber crime. There were at least five handles that shared the objectionable material. Twitter has to give details of the email address, phone number that were used to create the account. Secondly, they will also share the IP address from which the content was shared,” an officer privy to the investigation said.

The police have clarified that the case has not been registered against Twitter or any individual associated with the company, even as the NCPCR filed the complaint against the site.

“It is an FIR that has been registered against the unlawful activities involving various accounts and links on Twitter. The case is not against any individual or company. We will investigate the case to ascertain the culprits and fix responsibility, who could be individuals as well as the company,” a second cyber cell officer, who asked not to be named, said on Tuesday after the registration of the FIR.

The NCPCR filed the complaint with the then police commissioner SN Shrivastava, seeking an FIR against Twitter Inc and Twitter Communication India Private Limited (TCIPL), following an inquiry into the availability of child sexual abuse and pornographic material on the site. The NCPCR said Twitter did not report the handles uploading and sharing material, because of which it has violated the Indian laws related to the POCSO Act.

It asked the police chief for a copy of the FIR and action taken report in seven days. It sent a reminder on June 8 and summoned the cyber cell’s deputy commissioner of police, Anyesh Roy, to appear before the commission on June 29 (Tuesday) with the action taken report. The officer informed the commission on Tuesday afternoon that an FIR has been registered.

In a statement on Tuesday, a spokesperson for Twitter said the micro-blogging site has a zero-tolerance policy for child sexual exploitation (CSE). “We have a proactive approach to combating sexual exploitation of minors on our service. We have been at the forefront of responding to the evolving challenge of preventing the exploitation of children on the Internet and will continue to aggressively fight online child sexual abuse, as well as invest in the technology and tools that are essential to stay ahead of this issue. We will continue to invest in proactive detection and removal of content that violates Twitter rules and work with law enforcement and NGO partners in India to tackle the issue,” the spokesperson said.