Eye on law and order, Mumbai police pull down 6K objectionable posts

The team, including highly trained, tech-savvy police personnel, mines Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, YouTube, Telegrams, etc. using advanced filters.

The Mumbai police have pulled down 6,000 “objectionable posts” till August this year, compared to 4,800 throughout 2018, to curb the spread of misinformation or provocative forwards on social media. Ahead of the elections and festive season, vigilance on social media will be intensified further, said police.

Once detected, the content is immediately blocked or removed with the help of the service providers. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

“The Mumbai police’s social media lab under the special branch (SB1- intelligence unit of city police) keeps an eye on internet and social media platforms. The blocked material includes communal messages, hate posts, casteist speeches, objectionable videos and terrorism-related fake news posts,” said a senior police officer from the city police.

The team, including highly trained, tech-savvy police personnel, mines Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, YouTube, Telegrams, etc. using advanced filters.

Once detected, the content is immediately blocked or removed with the help of the service providers.

“These videos with false narratives possess a huge potential of portraying a small incident as big. Police keep a tab on such trends 24x7 to identify the platforms from where these videos or posts are published and pull them down or block them. Police agencies concerned are also told to ensure the situation doesn’t arise again,” the officer said.

Explaining the reason behind the rise in the number, the officer said: “This being an election year people associated with political parties, organisations and groups even used social media for mud-slinging…We do our job bearing in mind that people should not feel that we are curtailing their freedom of expression,” a senior officer part of the vigilance system said.

Preventive actions, the officer said, help in preventing untoward incidents, the most recent being a case in Hingoli. Earlier this week, two groups clashed in the region. Many shot videos of the incident, which went viral. Consequently, violence spread to the neighboring taluka of Aundha Nagnath. Amid the tension over scrapping of Article 370 in Kashmir, these videos became a serious concern. So apart from acting on ground, the police also took to the virtual world and pulled down dozens of “provocative” videos and messages.

Meanwhile, police have a word of caution for citizens too.

“Citizens should check authenticity and credibility of the content before sharing it on social media. Apart from creating tension, it may attract legal repercussions. Parents should also keep a watch on their children’s online activities,” said Vinoy Kumar Choubey, joint commissioner of police (law and order).

A recent example of legal trouble in the race to get more followers was a group on a popular video social networking site which was booked for creating unrest.

They later apologised through a video and secured anticipatory bail from the court.

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