Supreme Court emphasized the need for effective mechanism to regulate user-generated content, ensuring accountability for content uploaded online.
Concerns raised by the Supreme Court
- Virality and Velocity of Online Content: Harmful posts can go viral within seconds, rendering reactive takedown mechanisms ineffective before reputational or security damage occurs.
- Adult Content: One-line “adult content” warnings are insufficient and fail to prevent minors from accessing explicit material.
- Unregulated Nature of User-Generated Channels: Individuals can run online channels without regulatory oversight, enabling unverified or provocative content to spread unchecked
- Misinformation: While dissent is democratic, digital platforms become problematic when misinformation is used to incite hatred, distort facts, or trigger social unrest.
Proposal and Directions by Supreme Court
- Drafting of New Guidelines: Directed the Centre to frame fresh rules for all digital content – UGC (User Generated Content), OTT, news, and curated content —after public consultation.
- Autonomous Regulator: Court suggested establishing a neutral, independent authority to regulate online content, replacing or supplementing existing self-regulation models.
- Expert Committee: Constitute an expert committee with domain experts and persons with judicial background to study the issue.
- Age Verification System: Aadhaar or PAN-based checks were proposed to verify user age before accessing adult or explicit content, moving beyond mere disclaimers.
Existing Legal Mechanisms
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