The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) on Tuesday (November 7) issued an advisory to intermediaries, reminding them of their legal obligations under the IT Act with respect to the circulation of morphed content on their platforms. As per the law, intermediaries are required to take down any offensive, morphed, or objectionable content forthwith.
The advisory also stressed the penalty — imprisonment of up to three years for perpetrators under Section 66D.
Legal provisions cited by the ministry:
1. Section 66 D of Information Technology Act - Punishment for cheating by personation by using computer resources: imprisonment of up to 3 years and a fine of up to Rs 1 lakh.
2. IT Intermediary Rule 3(1)(b)(vii) - Social media intermediary must observe due diligence including ensuring the rules and regulations, privacy policy or user agreement of the intermediary inform users not to host any content that impersonates another person.
3. IT Intermediary Rule 3(2)(b) - Intermediary shall, within 24 hours from the receipt of a complaint in relation to any content in the nature of impersonation in an electronic form, including artificially morphed images of such individual, take all measures to remove or disable access to such content.
“Safety and trust of our Digital Nagriks is our unwavering commitment and top priority for the Narendra Modi Government. Given the significant challenges posed by misinformation and deep fakes, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) has issued a second advisory within the last six months, calling upon online platforms to take decisive actions against the spread of deep fakes,” Minister of state (MoS) for Electronics & IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said.
“It is a legal obligation for online platforms to prevent the spread of misinformation by any user under the Information Technology (IT) rules, 2021. They are further mandated to remove such content within 36 hours upon receiving a report from either a user or government authority. Failure to comply with this requirement invokes Rule 7, which empowers aggrieved individuals to take platforms to court under the provisions of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). It is imperative that platforms take proactive measures to combat this threat.”
This advisory comes a day after a deepfake video of actor Rashmika Mandanna, seen entering an elevator, was debunked. The original video was uploaded on Instagram by a British-Indian girl Zara Patel, as reported by factcheck journalist Abhishek Kumar. Patel had nothing to do with the deepfake video.
Mandanna said he was hurt by the widely circulated video, terming it "scary".
"I feel really hurt to share this and have to talk about the deepfake video of me being spread online. Something like this is honestly, extremely scary not only for me but also for each one of us who today is vulnerable to so much harm because of how technology is being misused."
First Published: Nov 7, 2023 3:06 PM IST
