Centre, Twitter India get SC notice to regulate content

February 12, 2021 12:40

The Supreme Court on Friday sought responses from the Centre and Twitter India on a plea seeking a mechanism for regulating content and advertisements spreading hatred through fake news and instigative messages via bogus accounts.

A bench of Chief Justice SA Bobde and justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian issued notice to the Centre and Twitter Communication India Pvt Ltd on the plea filed by one Vinit Goenka, which said there are hundreds of fake Twitter handles and bogus Facebook accounts in the name of eminent people and high dignitaries.

Advocate Ashwini Dubey, appearing for Goenka, said directions are needed for establishing a mechanism to regulate hateful content on the social networking site. The bench said that it is issuing notice in the matter and tagging the plea with other pending matters.

The plea filed through Dubey said, These fake Twitter handles and Facebook accounts use real photo of constitutional authorities and eminent citizens. Therefore, common man relies upon the messages published from these Twitter handles and Facebook accounts. The PIL said that fake news is the root cause of many riots, including the one in Delhi earlier this year, and bogus accounts are used to promote casteism and communalism which endangers fraternity and unity of the country.

It is submitted that presently total number of Twitter handles in India is around 35 million and total number of Facebook accounts is 350 million and experts says that around 10 per cent Twitter handles (3.5 million) and 10 per cent Facebook accounts (35 million) are duplicate/bogus/fake, the plea said. -- PTI

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