Twitter loses immunity to content created by Indian users by Reuters

By Aditya Kalra and Sankalp Phartiyal

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Twitter Inc. (NYSE 🙂 It is no longer protected against liability for user-generated content because the Indian microblogging giant in the United States is not complying with the new IT rules, the Indian government said in a court file.

The statement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration for the first time said that Twitter has officially lost its immunity after being criticized for not definitively complying with the company.

Conflict and public debate have raised concerns that U.S. companies will have difficulty doing business in a more stringent regulatory environment.

The Indian Ministry of Information Technology has told the New Delhi High Court that non-compliance with Twitter is a violation of the provisions of the IT Act, and that U.S. companies have lost their immunity, according to the July 5 filing.

The file was a case filed by a Twitter user who wanted to report some allegedly harmful tweets on the platform, and said the company did not comply with the new law requiring the appointment of certain new directors.

Twitter has not commented. The company has said before that it is making every effort to comply.

The new IT rules that came into force in late May in India are to regulate the content of social media companies and take greater responsibility for legal demands to remove messages quickly and share details about message creators.

Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has denounced Twitter for deliberately defying the law and said all social media companies must comply with the new rules.

In recent weeks, as criticism has increased between New Delhi and Twitter, Indian police have filed at least five cases against the company or its officials, some linked to child pornography and a controversial map of India on its career page.

Police in the two Indian states have named Twitter Indian leader Manish Maheshwari in the allegations. Separately, the state of Uttar Pradesh has sued a police bar against Maheshwari in the Supreme Court for allegedly using it to spread hatred on the platform after a low court protected him from arrest.