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Twitter withholds some accounts within India, vows to advocate free expression
The government has asked the social media company to take down accounts that were allegedly sharing misinformation and provocative content related to the ongoing farmers’ agitation
Twitter on Wednesday said it has not blocked handles of civil society activists, politicians, and journalists as “it would violate their fundamental right to free expression” guaranteed under the Indian law even as it has withheld some of the accounts that the government has flagged for blocking “within India only”.
The micro-blogging site vowed to continue advocating for the right to free expression of its users. It added it is “actively exploring options under Indian law — both for Twitter and for the accounts that have been impacted”.
The electronics and information technology ministry (MeitY) issued a notice to Twitter again last week asking it to block over 250 accounts and posts. Twitter had restored access to these accounts and posts after closing them briefly for using a controversial hashtag in connection with the ongoing farmers’ protest, officials said.
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The notice said that Twitter, by unblocking the accounts and posts, was in violation of Section 69 (A) of the Information Technology Act that can result in seven years’ imprisonment.
Twitter had on February 1 blocked access in India to accounts associated with the farmers’ protest on the government’s demand. Many of the blocked accounts used a hashtag referring to an alleged “genocide”. Among the handles temporarily withdrawn were those of Kisan Ekta Morcha. Following criticism over the move, Twitter unblocked them hours later.
“Incitement to Genocide is Not Freedom of Speech; It is Threat to Law & Order,” the government’s notice said.
Twitter, in its latest response, has said it has taken steps to reduce the visibility of the hashtags containing harmful content that included prohibiting them from trending on Twitter and appearing as recommended search terms.
Twitter has informed the ministry of its enforcement action. It said it has taken a range of enforcement actions against over 500 accounts. They include permanent suspension in certain cases for violation of Twitter rules.
“Beginning on 26 January 2021, our global team provided 24/7 coverage and took enforcement action judiciously and impartially on content, Trends, Tweets, and accounts that were in violation of the Twitter Rules,” the company said. It added that it took action on hundreds of accounts that violated the Twitter Rules, “particularly inciting violence, abuse, wishes of harm, and threats that could trigger the risk of offline harm”.
It added Twitter also “prevented certain terms that violated our Rules from appearing in the Trends section” and “suspended more than 500 accounts that were engaging in clear examples of platform manipulation and spam”.
The company said that “under the Twitter Rules, over the course of the last 10 days, Twitter has been served with several separate blocking orders by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Government of India, under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act”.
“Out of these, two were emergency blocking orders that we temporarily complied with but subsequently restored access to the content in a manner that we believe was consistent with Indian law. After we communicated this to MeitY, we were served with a non-compliance notice.”
It added separately, Twitter on Wednesday withheld a portion of the accounts identified in the blocking orders under the Country Withheld Content policy within India only. “These accounts continue to be available outside of India.” Twitter added that the company does not believe that the actions it has been asked to take are consistent with Indian law and refused to take action against any journalists or media entities. “In keeping with our principles of defending protected speech and freedom of expression, we have not taken any action on accounts that consist of news media entities, journalists, activists, and politicians. To do so, we believe, would violate their fundamental right to free expression under Indian law. We informed MeitY of our enforcement actions today, February 10, 2021. We will continue to maintain dialogue with the Indian government and respectfully engage with them,” Twitter said in a blog post.
Ruling Bharatiya Janata Party lawmaker Tejasvi Surya hit out at Twitter, saying it seems to hold itself above the laws. “It is picking and choosing what law to follow and what not to. I had raised this issue in Zero Hour in Lok Sabha yesterday [Tuesday], but zero hour wasn’t taken up yesterday. Requesting @GoI_MeitY to act stringently,” he tweeted.
The government chose Koo, the Indian microblogging platform launched in April 2020 as an alternative to Twitter, to respond. “Upon the request of Twitter seeking a meeting with the Govt., the Secretary IT was to engage with senior management of Twitter. In this light a [Twitter] blog post published prior to this engagement is unusual. Govt. will share its response soon.”
