Social Media and the Law
26th August 2019
Dear Reader,
Keeping a track of news at the intersection of Indian society and tech can often be an exercise in patience. Some weeks there is such a deluge of developments that picking the most interesting stories is a ridiculously difficult task. And some weeks there is so little being done or written that there isn’t enough content to fill out even a weekly newsletter. Hence our second consecutive two-week break. Which means that there might be periods of time when the newsletter is out only once every fortnight, or it becomes bi-weekly. This seems only right. When the tech and policy landscape in the country is in a state of flux, why not a newsletter that covers these areas too. At any rate, read on for some fascinating developments below.
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Schroedinger’s Litigation
The ongoing litigation before the Madras High Court on the question of traceability in encrypted social media could have profound implications for the very future of such platforms. However, there seems to be a lot of confusion and drama over the exact nature of the case. Facebook asked the Supreme Court to transfer this case (along with others) to it and in the hearing on this issue, there was a great deal of back and forth on whether social media accounts should be linked to Aadhaar. This led to several news reports which suggested that the Government of India and of Tamil Nadu are in favour of such a linkage. But it turns out that this wasn’t the case and the governments actually argued the exact opposite. Read on to understand why this confusion arose.
The Judiciary and the Internet
In keeping with the theme of internet-related litigations in India, this slightly old blog post by Divij Joshi remains a fascinating read on the approach of the Indian judiciary to the internet and its conceptualization of Indian cyberspace.
Share the Love
The Indian social media landscape is dominated by platforms like TikTok, Sharechat, and Helo. Most of these platforms offer a convenient and easy way to upload and share user-driven content, primarily in the form of short videos. But who owns these videos? Is it the platform? The users? Nobody? TikTok believes it owns any video uploaded on its platform and has asked Sharechat to take-down some videos for ‘copyright infringement’. This act, however, opens a can of worms. If TikTok is the ultimate owner of these videos, then what happens to intermediary liability? Can TikTok now be held responsible for all the content on its platform? Interesting questions that might soon need to be answered.
I Don’t See You?
Governments in India are becoming increasingly fascinated by the potential of facial recognition technology. There is a surge of new startups focusing on these technologies, and several pilot projects being run by various local governments. But exactly how effective is facial recognition at the moment? Not at all, it turns out. The governments in India, whether central or state, must be wary of relying on technologies whose efficacy has not been proven yet. However, they still soldier on. In other news, protestors in Hong Kong are taking down facial recognition towers.
Let The State Protect Your Data
The state of Uttar Pradesh has asked several leading internet companies and platforms to begin storing data collected in the state locally. The idea is to ‘not move data of Uttar Pradesh users outside the state’. While at first instance this might seem like a good idea, it raises significant questions of both commercial viability and the potential misuse of this data by the state government in the absence of a national data protection law.
The Stories We Tell Ourselves
Technologies, technology adoption, and technology policy do not exist in a vacuum. They are shaped by local narratives of the technologies themselves and their purported end-goals. But what have been these narratives in India? Who builds these narratives and who shapes them? And how does it affect our approach to new technologies? The latest edition of EPW has a fascinating set of essays that delve into these questions. If you are interested in these questions, this edition is a perfect week-long reading assignment.
How Do You Regulate A Giant?
Mainstream internet can now be best described as a loose federation of semi-competitive monopolies. A handful of platforms dominate vast swathes of cyberspace. In such a scenario what is the role of competition law, which was developed under very different circumstances? What makes the online space unique in the competition realm? And how can competition authorities evolve to ensure the internet remains competitive while allowing platforms to build business models that have worked so well till now? Rahul Matthan highlights the most important of these questions from the Indian perspective.
