HC vacates TikTok ban, but red-flags its content
VIOLATIONS ON SOCIAL MEDIA ANGER COURTS IN TAMIL NADU
Srikkanth.D@timesgroup.com
Madurai:25.04.2019
The Madurai bench of the Madras high court on Wednesday vacated its April 3 interim order prohibiting downloading of video sharing app TikTok after the Chinese company submitted that it has moderating mechanisms in place to regulate obscene content and it is only an intermediary platform, which does not upload content.
A division bench of justices N Kirubakaran and S S Sundar warned that if the regulatory mechanisms were not found to be effective as stated by the company, it would be charged with contempt of court.
Senior counsel Isaac Mohanlal representing TikTok argued that the company followed all laid-down standards and had better privacy provisions than other social media platforms.
When senior counsel said TikTok had not violated any laws, the court said it is because we don’t have any laws to address the issues concerning social media platforms and cited instances where Parliament took several years to pass legislation.
The court also took note of submissions by amicus curiae Arvind Datar who said that banning the app, which is only an intermediary website, cannot be the solution and cited previous judgments of the Supreme Court and the guidelines of the Information Technology Act.
Courts should be the last resort, says Datar
“An intermediary shall not be liable for any data not uploaded by them. There is no obligation on their part for pre-censorship,” said senior counsel citing Supreme Court judgments.
The amicus curiae also said that he met with he officials of the ministry of electronics and information technology and, so far, the Union government had blocked 14,220 websites between 2010 and 2018 and that this was the first case in the country on an intermediary website.
Datar said any person with a grievance against an intermediary website should first approach the grievance official of the company and then the authorities and the courts only as a last resort. “What is statutorily legal cannot be judicially impermissible,” Datar said.
The court, however expressed concern that there was no statutory protection for children and asked whether the Union of India would enact a statute like the Children Online Privacy Protection Act, enacted by the United States, to prevent children from becoming cyber victims.
On April 3, the court had issued an interim direction to the Centre to prohibit downloading of TikTok mobile app.
The court observed that pornography and inappropriate content were made available through the app. The court directions were in response to a petition which sought a ban on the app stating that it encouraged disturbing content and degraded culture.
The court asked whether the government would enact a statute like the Children Online Privacy Protection Act, enacted by the US, to prevent children from becoming cyber victims
VIOLATIONS ON SOCIAL MEDIA ANGER COURTS IN TAMIL NADU
Srikkanth.D@timesgroup.com
Madurai:25.04.2019
The Madurai bench of the Madras high court on Wednesday vacated its April 3 interim order prohibiting downloading of video sharing app TikTok after the Chinese company submitted that it has moderating mechanisms in place to regulate obscene content and it is only an intermediary platform, which does not upload content.
A division bench of justices N Kirubakaran and S S Sundar warned that if the regulatory mechanisms were not found to be effective as stated by the company, it would be charged with contempt of court.
Senior counsel Isaac Mohanlal representing TikTok argued that the company followed all laid-down standards and had better privacy provisions than other social media platforms.
When senior counsel said TikTok had not violated any laws, the court said it is because we don’t have any laws to address the issues concerning social media platforms and cited instances where Parliament took several years to pass legislation.
The court also took note of submissions by amicus curiae Arvind Datar who said that banning the app, which is only an intermediary website, cannot be the solution and cited previous judgments of the Supreme Court and the guidelines of the Information Technology Act.
Courts should be the last resort, says Datar
“An intermediary shall not be liable for any data not uploaded by them. There is no obligation on their part for pre-censorship,” said senior counsel citing Supreme Court judgments.
The amicus curiae also said that he met with he officials of the ministry of electronics and information technology and, so far, the Union government had blocked 14,220 websites between 2010 and 2018 and that this was the first case in the country on an intermediary website.
Datar said any person with a grievance against an intermediary website should first approach the grievance official of the company and then the authorities and the courts only as a last resort. “What is statutorily legal cannot be judicially impermissible,” Datar said.
The court, however expressed concern that there was no statutory protection for children and asked whether the Union of India would enact a statute like the Children Online Privacy Protection Act, enacted by the United States, to prevent children from becoming cyber victims.
On April 3, the court had issued an interim direction to the Centre to prohibit downloading of TikTok mobile app.
The court observed that pornography and inappropriate content were made available through the app. The court directions were in response to a petition which sought a ban on the app stating that it encouraged disturbing content and degraded culture.
The court asked whether the government would enact a statute like the Children Online Privacy Protection Act, enacted by the US, to prevent children from becoming cyber victims
No comments:
Post a Comment