Rajeev Chandrasekhar,Minister of State for Electronics and IT
“Intermediaries should take additional measures to not permit any advertisements of illegal loan and betting apps. Intermediaries have been warned that non-compliance will lead to losing exemption from liability provided under Section 79(1) of IT Act,” the reply said.
New Delhi:
The government on Friday said it is regularly monitoring the compliances of intermediaries with the IT Rules, 2021 and the direction given in the latest advisory by the IT Ministry.
Replying to a question in the Rajya Sabha, Minister of State for Electronics and IT, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, said that MeitY has directed intermediary platforms that their users should be clearly communicated in clear and precise language under Rule 3(1)(b) of the IT Rules, 2021.
“It is also advised that the same must be expressly informed to the users at the time of first-registration and also as regular reminders, in particular, at every instance of login and while uploading/sharing information onto the platform. Intermediaries were directed to ensure compliance to the various mandates of this advisory,” the minister said.
On December 26, 2023, the government had issued the advisory for all intermediaries, directing them that the terms of use should be completely aligned to Rule 3(1)(b) of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021.
The advisory asked intermediaries to make users aware of penal provisions under IPC, IT Act and other laws that may be attracted in case of violation of Rule 3(1)(b).
“Intermediaries should take additional measures to not permit any advertisements of illegal loan and betting apps. Intermediaries have been warned that non-compliance will lead to losing exemption from liability provided under Section 79(1) of IT Act,” the reply said.
Meanwhile, Chandrasekhar said the government is mulling to come with a framework to prevent exploitation of content creators by big platforms on internet, minister of state for electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said on Friday.
The minister said that big powerful commercial platforms online have started to distort fundamental characteristic of openness of the internet.
“I think to maintain the openness, the symmetry between those who create the content and those who distribute the content, there is a need for some sort of conversation or discussion.
“If I may dare to say so, some form of a framework that will prevent these big platforms from exploiting the content creators, whether that’s a large news organization or an individual content creator,” the minister said at the ET Now Global Business Summit.
He said the government has looked at the issue very closely.
“We certainly don’t like that it is not allowing small content creators to be confident that his or her content is being monetised fairly and he or she is getting fair returns for that content. There is a conversation that is ongoing and I hope with the third term of our honourable prime minister we will be able to enact the Digital India Act,” the ministers said.
Talking about the government’s fact check unit, the minister said it was to help those platforms which wanted to label misinformation.
In response to a question on threat to jobs from AI, the minister said he has developed a high sense of intuition that AI will create more opportunities in the workforce in terms of companies, enterprises, startups, etc.
“It will certainly replace some jobs. It will certainly transform some job roles. AI in its current form will certainly allow companies to do more. There is going to be disruption. There’s going to be transformation. There are going to be new job roles created, which will require new skills, new talented workforce, new talent to the workforce,” Chandrasekhar said.