After days of face-off with the government over the new and stringent information technology intermediary rules, seven social media giants on Friday complied with major provisions of the regulations that require the platforms to create India-based redressal mechanisms.
Government sources said WhatsApp, Facebook, Koo, LinkedIn, Sharechat, Telegram and Google today complied with the new rules and shared with the Ministry of Information Technology details of their chief compliance officers, nodal contact persons and grievance officers to address local complaints regarding unlawful messages.
Twitter is yet to follow the rule and told the Indian government that it is nominating a lawyer as its Nodal Contact Person and Grievance Officer. According to the rules, the officers should be employees of the company and residents in India. Interestingly, Twitter sent the communication to the Indian govt late last night, a day which saw the Indian govt slamming twitter over non-implementation of new IT rules.
Officials said after a firm response from the government on Thursday, Twitter sent a communication late last night sharing details of a lawyer working in a law firm in India as their nodal contact person and grievance officer.
But this does not tantamount to compliance. The new rules require that these designated officers of significant social media companies must be the employees of the company and residing in India. Twitter has not yet sent the details of the chief compliance officer to the ministry,” an official said.
IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had clarified that the government is fully recognised and respected the right of privacy of people and that ordinary users of WhatsApp had nothing to fear about the new rules. “The objective is to find the first originator of an offensive message already in circulation,” he said.
