SC forms panel to suggest ways to block rape videos, child pornography

Satya Prakash

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 22

The Supreme Court on Wednesday constituted a high-level committee comprising senior government officials and representatives from social networking sites to explore ways to stop rape videos and child pornographic material getting uploaded on social networking sites.

Headed by Dr Ajay Kumar, Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, the committee will have Dr Sanjay Behl of Indian Computer Emergency Response Team, Rakesh Maheshwari, a cyber law and security expert with the government, two representatives of the Ministry of Home Affairs and two representatives each from Microsoft, Google, Facebook and Yahoo.

A Bench headed by Justice MB Lokur gave 15 days to the committee beginning April 5 to meet, deliberate and suggest solutions to the problem.

The Bench said if the committee came to the conclusion that there was no technological solution available to the problem, it should give reasons and explain why it was not possible to block uploading and circulating videos of rape, gang-rape and child pornography.

It ordered the committee to submit its report in a sealed cover by April 24, the next date of hearing.

The court is seized of a PIL filed by Prajwala, an NGO, highlighting shocking instances of uploading of gang-rape videos on Yahoo and WhatsApp messenger services.

In February 2015, it had taken suo motu cognisance of a letter written by the NGO and converted it into a PIL.

The NGO had also sent two gang-rape videos with its letter for appropriate action.

Earlier, cyber security experts from the CBI had told the Bench that internet was a “wild highway” and blocking objectionable content at the source was a technical challenge for which clear guidelines needed to be issued to stop circulation of such material.

They had told the top court that 50 countries have set up hotlines to stop child abuse in their jurisdiction but India was yet to start such a service.

The officials had said they were taking assistance of the INTERPOL to stop child pornography, and whenever any complaint was received, the internet service providers were asked to block the objectionable content.

The Centre had earlier informed the court that it would set up a specialised agency to block and curb sharing of sexual offence videos on social networking platforms.

It had asked the internet majors to come out with a “firewall” on the lines of the one evolved in China that automatically prevents uploading of any offensive material on the social media platforms.