Twitter said it was very concerned with the “recent events” regarding its employees in India and “the potential threat to freedom of expression”.
On Thursday, micro-blogging website Twitter said it was very concerned with the “recent events” regarding its employees in the country and “the potential threat to freedom of expression” for its users.
“We, alongside many in civil society in India and around the world, have concerns with regards to the use of intimidation tactics by the police in response to enforcement of our global Terms of Service, as well as with core elements of the new IT Rules. We plan to advocate for changes to elements of these regulations that inhibit free, open public conversation,” a Twitter spokesperson said.
The statement by the social media giant comes days after the Special Cell of Delhi Police had earlier this week on Monday visited Twitter offices in Delhi and Gurgaon to to allegedly serve a notice asking the company executives to join in the investigation regarding the alleged “toolkit” seeking to undermine Indian government’s response to Covid-19, released on Twitter.
The spokesman, however, added that Twitter would continue “constructive dialogue” with the Indian government to adopt a collaborative approach to safeguard the interests of the public.
Twitter, other than its concern over the police visiting its office, said that the company was concerned that one person, the chief compliance officer, was being made criminally liable for all the content on the platform.
The company said: “The requirement of proactive monitoring and a near blanket authority to the government and its agencies to seek information about users represented a dangerous overreach, which was inconsistent with democratic principles followed in countries.”
The action by the Delhi Police is latest in a series of confrontations between the Indian government and the US-based micro-blogging website over critical tweets on a range of issues – from the farmers’ protests to the Government’s Covid response.
Twitter, in January and February, had initially refused to take down certain tweets about farmer protests flagged by the IT Ministry for allegedly “spreading misinformation” and having the potential to “lead to imminent violence affecting public order situation in the country”.
The inaction by Twitter led to IT Ministry threatening to jail Twitter India employees if the platform failed to act. The platform later said it had complied with 95 per cent of requests that the Government had made.
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