After a spate of violation by Twitter, this micro-blogging site is now all set to lose the intermediary status it enjoys in India following its failure to comply with the new IT laws.
As per reports in ANI reports, Twitter will be directly and editorially responsible for all the posts published on its platform. Twitter is the only mainstream social media platform in India that has failed to comply with the new rules.
Twitter to lose its status as intermediary platform in India as it does not comply with new guidelines, it is the only social media platform among mainstream that has not adhered to new laws: Government sources
— ANI (@ANI) June 16, 2021
As a result, if any alleged unlawful content is published in its platform, Twitter will be treated as a publisher and not an intermediary, which makes it open to prosecution under various sections of the IPC.
However, an Economic Times report has claimed that Twitter has already lost its intermediary status despite reminders and extensions from the government as it did not appoint three key executives as permanent employees and for damage control, it has only appointed an interim compliance officer on a contractual basis.
Meanwhile, the Ghaziabad Police has also filed an FIR against Twitter and others over a video shared on the social media platform with the “deliberate and malicious intention to foment religious discord”. Despite the Ghaziabad issuing clarification on the beard chopping incident of a Muslim man in Uttar Pradesh, Twitter failed to report this as manipulated media which was shared by Congress politicians and online influencers.
The Ghaziabad Police has accused Twitter of “doing nothing to prevent the video from getting viral,” naming the company, Twitter Communications India Private Limited.
Twitter now also has to appear before the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information and Technology on 18 June and present its views.
It must be noted that the Union Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) had sent its final notice to Twitter last week over its compliance to the new IT norms.
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