India to ban fake information on social media platforms

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India to ban fake information on social media platforms

An officer looks at computer screens inside a police war room set to monitor social media posts in Jaipur.

NEW DELHI Reuters -- India's government will not allow social media platforms to host any information that it identifies as false, according to a draft proposal of the country's IT rules released this week.

This is the latest in a series of measures taken by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi that are seen as efforts to rein in big tech firms.

Any information identified as false or false by the Press Information Bureau PIB or any other agency authorised for fact-checking by the government or its department in which such business is transacted would be disqualified from being allowed under the draft.

Once information was identified as such, social media platforms or other online intermediaries would have to make reasonable efforts to make sure users don't host, display, upload, modify, publish, transmit, store, update or share such information, it added.

In October, the government announced that a panel would be set up to listen to complaints from users regarding content moderation decisions of social media firms, which are already required to appoint in-house grievance redressal officers and executives to coordinate with law enforcement officials.

The government has repeatedly been involved in tussles with various platforms when they failed to heed demands for certain content or accounts to be taken down for spreading misinformation.