Twitter India losses its intermediary status: What’s next?

Twitter India is facing a crucial backlash from the government right now. Twitter one of the most popular social networking platform based in the United States. Twitter is functional and very active in many countries and is growing its user base day by day. Indian government mandated few rules for social networking sites to compile, and sites like Facebook already agreed to this and moved on. But, Twitter on other hand did not comply with the new rules set by Indian IT Laws. Now, Twitter losses intermediary status in India and will be going through a rough ride with the Indian IT sector.

What does it mean, when we say Twitter losses intermediary status?

Every social media platform is exempted from local laws for having certain sort of content on their websites. Since users are the ones posting it, sites cannot be held responsible for those posts. Most of the countries offer this to almost all social media platforms. But, since Twitter loses those rights, Twitter will be held responsible for any content uploaded to their site and will be sent court notices for further investigation.

Does this impact Twitter?

Yes, Twitter not complying with local laws is always going to impact it in one way or another. Currently, there is an FIR filed in Uttar Pradesh on Twitter regarding the Ghaziabad incident. Twitter will be held responsible for this case and should appear in court in order to clear this case off. But, this might just be the beginning, since many more cases will be piling up on Twitter in the future.

What rules should Twitter India follow in order to remove intermediary status?

The government of India February announced new rules to regulate big social media platforms in India, that includes Facebook, WhatsApp, and Twitter. According to these new rules, social media platforms will be held more accountable for local legal requests for the removal of certain posts. All the social media platforms will have a 36 hours deadline to remove posts that are legally requested. And, within three months, big social media sites should appoint new executives to coordinate with law enforcement. These new rules come soon after Twitter failed to remove certain posts related to farmers’ protests in India.

Will this impact users?

Absolutely not, as of now. Twitter India, will be held responsible for any content you post on their site. If they need to answer for every Tweet user’s Tweet, they might need to put some strict filters on what content users can post. Apart from that users will not be noticing any difference.

India’s Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar slammed Twitter in a series of Tweets. “However, if any foreign entity believes that they can portray itself as the flag bearer of free speech in India to excuse itself from complying with the law of the land, such attempts are misplaced,” said Ravi Shankar.

Twitter still got time to comply with new rules, but Twitter is staying quiet on this issue. But, our insider sources report Twitter is already on its way to comply with new rules very soon.

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