Ankhi Das, Facebook's public policy director for India and South Asia and its top executive in New Delhi, said fake news is a menace in any society and we must have a very strong containment strategy, reported
CNN.
Social networking giant has been facing mounting criticism that the flow of rumours on its platform has sparked violence and led to physical harm to people in countries around the world, including in India.
India is a very, very big priority for us company wide.
The big takeaway: India needs a data protection law.
Facebook is already available in 11 Indian languages but we do anticipate that that is a momentum that will continue to grow.
We do think that video consumption is going to increase in a variety of ways, for a variety of needs, from entertainment to politics to news.
I think the stability and growth of the internet is all going to be driven by how safe people feel on the internet.Indian market to Facebook
It has leadership attention of an extremely high order.
I am extremely bullish in terms of opportunity and the diversity that our country offers for any internet platform to be successful.
The future is already here as far as India is concerned. It's not the future of internet which will come at some point of time, it's already here.Potential Of Vernacular languages In India
I think our main area of work where we have to do a lot more is making sure that our language localisation moves much farther and faster.
A lot of the internet consumption is happening in local languages.On Video Content
Video is a big priority for us company wide, and in India too.
We have a large business partnerships team which is looking into this and working with our product teams to make sure that India continues to be a very big focus.Digital Literacy
A lot of the people who are coming online in the next phase of growth are going to be first time internet users.
We have a lot of rural users who are coming online for the first time. Making sure that they can teach themselves how to keep safe is something that we are highly invested in.Fighting Abuse
We are very, very committed to abuse prevention of any form.
Facebook will have to make sure that the next phase of growth and online users, many of them women and children, have a safe environment to engage.Fake News Menace
Fighting fake news and misinformation is a constant process and something where has to share a load and carry some responsibility.
When people are consuming content they have to have the capacity to distinguish what is fake and what is true. I think there is a capacity gap and we have a responsibility to address that gap, and that is what we are doing.Female Internet Users
Women have the tools which makes it easier for them to start a business, build market access, recognition and build a viable business.
It's not just about them creating viable businesses but also lifting other women, getting them to enter the workforce, and that is uplifting. When you have economic power at home you have negotiation power too.Upcoming State and Parliament Elections
The first element is maintaining elections integrity, which means that we are going to enforce policies. We are going to be very strict in terms of enforcing against fake accounts.
We are going to be doing a close hard look in terms of enforcing against fakes and other activities.
Our goal now is to educate political parties about what is allowed on the platform and what is not.Government Regulations
We as a company across the board respect privacy regulation.
If you look at the history of globalisation, the first phase was about globalisation of capital, the current phase is about globalisation of data.
Digitalisation is global in character, it's not insular. Therefore, if you bring in very strict definitions of data localisation, across a range of sectors, I think, it is a perverse thing and should not happen.
