Freedom House Report Criticises India for Internet Shutdowns, New IT Rules and More

“Where democratic checks and balances are lacking, government officials will exploit regulation to punish any company that moderates politicians’ speech, or pushes back against arbitrary orders to remove content or hand over data.”

These lines come from Freedom House’s latest edition of the ‘Freedom of the Net’ report and immediately precede a mention of the Indian government’s dealings with social media platform Twitter over the past year.

The report describes Indian officials as having “pressured” Twitter into removing commentary critical of itself, related to its handling of the COVID-19 crisis in the country. It also notes that the government made Twitter stop flagging “manipulated content shared by the ruling party” and makes a reference to Indian officials migrating to the Bangalore-based microblogging site Koo as an alternative to the American-owned Twitter….

https://thewire.in/rights/freedom-house-india-digital-freedom-twitter-it-rules-shutdown