WILL NOT BLOCK MEDIA, ACTIVIST ACCOUNTS, TWITTER TELLS GOVT AMID ROW

NEW DELHI: Twitter on Wednesday said it has not blocked handles of civil society activists, politicians, and journalists as “it would violate their fundamental right to free expression” guaranteed under the Indian law even as it has withheld some of the accounts that the government has flagged for blocking “within India only”.

The micro-blogging site in a blog post vowed to continue advocating for the right to free expression of its users. It added it is “actively exploring options under Indian law — both for Twitter and for the accounts that

have been impacted”.

The government, however, termed as “unusual” Twitter’s move to publish the blog post before slated talks with the secretary of the ministry electronics and information technology (MeitY) on the issue, as sought by the US-based social media company.

MeitY has issued a notice to Twitter again last week asking it to block over 250 accounts and posts. Twitter had restored access to these accounts and posts after closing them briefly for using a controversial hashtag in connection with the ongoing farmers’ protest, officials said.

The notice said that Twitter, by unblocking the accounts and posts, was in violation of section 69(A) of the Information Technology Act that can result in seven years’ imprisonment.

Twitter had on February 1 blocked access in India to accounts associated with the farmers’ protest on the government’s demand. Many of the blocked accounts used a hashtag referring to an alleged “genocide”.

Among the handles temporarily withdrawn were those of Kisan Ekta Morcha. Following criticism over the move, Twitter unblocked them hours later.

“Incitement to Genocide is Not Freedom of Speech; It is Threat to Law & Order,” the government’s notice said.

Twitter, in its latest response, has said it has taken steps to reduce the visibility of the hashtags containing harmful content that included prohibiting them from trending on Twitter and appearing as recommended search terms.

Twitter has informed the ministry of its enforcement action.

It said it has taken a range of enforcement actions against over 500 accounts.

They include permanent suspension in certain cases for violation of Twitter rules.

“Beginning on 26 January 2021, our global team provided 24/7 coverage and took enforcement action judiciously and impartially on content, Trends, Tweets, and accounts that were in violation of the Twitter Rules,” the company said.

It added that it took action on hundreds of accounts that violated Twitter rules, “particularly inciting violence, abuse, wishes of harm, and threats that could trigger the risk of offline harm”.

It added that Twitter also “prevented certain terms that violated our Rules from appearing in the Trends section” and “suspended more than 500 accounts that were engaging in clear examples of platform manipulation and spam”.

The company said that “under the Twitter Rules, over the course of the last 10 days, Twitter has been served with several separate blocking orders by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Government of India, under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act”.

“Out of these, two were emergency blocking orders that we temporarily complied with but subsequently restored access to the content in a manner that we believe was consistent with Indian law. After we communicated this to MeitY, we were served with a non-compliance notice.”

It added, separately, that the platform has withheld a portion of the accounts identified in the blocking orders under the Country Withheld Content policy within India only.

“These accounts continue to be available outside of India.”

Twitter added that the company does not believe that the actions it has been asked to take are consistent with Indian law and refused to take action against any journalists or media entities.

The government chose Koo, the Indian microblogging platform launched in April 2020 as an alternative to Twitter, to respond.