Home Secretary meets Twitter officials, seeks action over 'objectionable' content

Union Home Secretary Rajiv Gauba on Monday held a meeting with Twitter officials, asking the micro-blogging site to take prompt action over "objectionable" content on the platform, an official statement said.

Vijaya Gadde, Global Head of Legal, Policy, Trust and Safety Lead at Twitter, and Mahima Kaul, Indian Representative of Twitter, were asked "to ensure a 24x7 mechanism for prompt disposal of requisitions of law enforcement agencies for deletion of unlawful/objectionable content from their platform".

"In the recent past, some cases of uploading and posting of objectionable content, which are likely to disrupt public peace or order and incite criminal offences including communal violence have been posted on Twitter," it said, adding that action was taken for the removal of such content from public access.

However, action taken by Twitter, it said, has been slow in some cases and compliance for removal of unlawful content has been about 60 per cent "even where orders have been issued by the competent authority after following due process of law".

"During the meeting, instances of legal requisitions were shown where the Delhi Police had sought removal of content openly inciting violence where response by Twitter had been neither full nor timely."

"Specific legal notices issued by the Delhi Police seeking investigation-related information were also shared."

The Ministry said a series of meetings were held this year with social media platforms including Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp and Twitter "to sensitise them about preventive and other actions to remove unlawful content immediately".

--IANS

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