Twitter lost immunity for non-compliance with IT Rules: Centre to HC

Govt counsel says grievance officer located in the US; Twitter said on Saturday it is in the process to appoint a local one

Microblogging platform Twitter did not comply with the new Information Technology Rules, and has therefore lost its immunity, provided to intermediaries under Section 79(1) of the Information Technology Act, 2000, the government has told the Delhi High Court.

This was said in an affidavit filed by lawyer Amit Acharya, who filed a petition against Twitter over non-compliance with the new Information Technology rules that went into effect on May 26, 2021. Acharya said in the affidavit on Monday that  he came across some allegedly defamatory tweets, and when he sought to register a complaint, he only found contact details of a grievance officer located in the US on Twitter's website/mobile app.

The "immunity" or safe harbour is the protection provided to intermediaries like Twitter, Google, Facebook, Koo, ShareChat and others, under the IT Act. It enables intermediaries to protect themselves from liability for any third party information, data, or communication link made available or hosted by them.

Losing safe harbour would mean platforms could become liable under law for third party and user-generated content hosted by them.

On May 31, the High Court issued a notice to the social media giant giving it three weeks to reply, and set the matter for further hearing on July 6.

Twitter on Saturday informed the Delhi High Court that it was in the final stages of appointing a new resident grievance officer. The firm had been issued a notice by the high court over its alleged non-compliance with the new information technology rules.

A hearing in the case, based on a public interest litigation by Acharya,  is scheduled for Tuesday.

Appointing a resident grievance officer is one of several norms which Twitter and other social media platforms operating in India have to follow under the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Ethics Code) Rules, 2021. The Rules were notified in February 25 and came into effect on May 26.

On June 27, Twitter's interim resident grievance officer Dharrmendra Chatur resigned, following which, Twitter appointed US-based Jeremy Kessel as its new resident grievance officer in India, which put it in violation of the new rules.

"Any non-compliance amounts to breach of the provisions of the IT Rules, 2021 thereby leading to Respondent No. 2 losing its immunity conferred under section 79(1) of the IT Act, 2000. I state that the immunity conferred on intermediaries under section 79(1) is a conditional immunity subject to the intermediary satisfying the conditions under sections 79(2) and 79(3). As provided in Rule 7, failure to observe the IT rules,2021 results in provisions of Section 79(1) of the IT Act, 2000 not being applicable to such an intermediary," Acharya said in the affidavit on Monday.

Twitter and the government are embroiled in controversy since January, when Twitter restored some tweets that were asked to be taken down by the government for possibility to incite violence, as a part of the farmers' protests.