The Delhi High Court, on October 22, 2020, directed Facebook and Google to remove ‘objectionable photos’ of a woman, which were initially uploaded by one of her former schoolmates in 2012 and subsequently circulated by multiple users without her consent.
The woman, now aged 24, had petitioned the court to issue directions to various social media companies to remove all the offending URLS, more than 50 in number, containing her images. According to her plea, she had become ‘very close friends’ with a male classmate when she was 16. As their relationship soured and turned abusive, he started blackmailing her emotionally, compelling her to send intimate photographs of hers to him. She said she complied then as he had threatened to take his life otherwise.
After completing her schooling, she secured admission in an institution in the UK in August 2014 and moved out of India. The man attacked her when she was abroad after which he was even held guilty by a foreign court, which issued restraining orders against him.
She told the court that in October–November 2019, she found out that he had posted intimate pictures of hers on various platforms, such as Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.
In July 2020, the court asked these platforms to remove the URLs and objectionable content. But the photographs, which had been widely circulated by then, were already being uploaded by people other than the man.
Justice Vibhu Bakhru also directed the police to forward the offending material to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), the nodal agency for the online cyber reporting portal, stating that the content fell within the scope of sexually explicit material relating to a child.
The court in its order said that the presence of photos on the Internet despite removal of the links “brought into sharp focus the problem of preventing circulation of identified objectionable material on the platforms operated on the net”.
The court also ruled that it is necessary for social media sites to take all effective measures available to ensure that child pornographic content is not hosted on their platforms. It said that police must identify those re-uploading the offensive content in India and take action. The court referred to Section 20 of the POCSO Act and Rule 11 of the POCSO Rules, 2020.
The court ordered the NCRB to use the protocols available in terms of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) entered into with NCMEC (National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children) or otherwise to notify the offending material in order that the same can be actioned and removed from other platforms as well.
Facebook (FB), in an affidavit, informed the court that it had implemented a number of measures to combat the spread of child pornography, including working with National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), a non-profit organisation involved in helping find missing children, reduce child sexual exploitation, and prevent child victimisation.
Facebook said that NCMEC had created Cyber Tipline, providing an online forum to receive reports of suspected child porn content on the internet. Upon identifying child pornography on its platforms, FB immediately removes the content.
Google also filed an affidavit claiming that it had adopted various protocols to deal with child pornography or Child Sexual Abuse Material on its YouTube platform. Google said the measures included removal of objectionable content on individual reporting and the Trusted Flagger Program to provide robust tools to individuals, government agencies, and non-government organisations for effectively notifying objectionable content on YouTube.
Following the affidavits, the court directed the social media platforms and agencies to remove the content, subject to technological limitations, and disposed of the plea by the woman.
Courtesy: The Indian Express, Scroll.in, HT