The Indian govt. has donned Talibani hat and is gearing up to control Internet and information disseminated in the upcoming IT bill.
The last updated IT bill was passed in 2008 and the latest changes sounds like an attempt to control information.
Here are a few points from the amendment:
- The Secretary, Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications & Information Technology, Government of India shall designate and notify in official Gazette, an officer of the Central Government, not below the rank of a Joint Secretary, for issuing directions for blocking for access by the public any information generated, transmitted, received, stored or hosted in any computer resource
- The designated officer may by order direct any Agency of the Government or intermediaries to block for access by the public any information or part thereof generated, transmitted, received, stored or hosted in any computer resource for any of the reasons specified in sub-section (1) of section 69A of the Act.
- Any person may send their complaint to the concerned Organisation for blocking of access by the public any information generated, transmitted, received, stored or hosted in any computer resource.
- In the event of approval of the Request by the Secretary, Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications & Information Technology, Government of India, under Rule (14) and Rule (15), the Designated Officer will direct the Intermediaries to block the offending information generated, transmitted, received, stored or hosted in their computer resource for public access within the time limit specified in the direction.
The missing link in the entire process is provision for one to contest the decision. Designated officers have all the right to block what they feel violates the rule.
Reasons to block (if you violate the following):
- Interest of sovereignty or integrity of India
- Defence of India
- Security of the State
- Friendly relations with foreign States
- Public order
- For preventing incitement to the commission of any cognisable offence relating to above
New Agency – Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT)
Govt. is planning to start a CERT (Computer Emergency Response Team) which shall function as the trusted referral agency for cyber users in India for responding to cyber security incidents and will assist cyber users in the country in implementing measures to reduce the risk of cyber security incidents.
Essentially, CERT can ask service providers to share any data it wants!
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Before things get on to you and your site, you can mail your views to Dr. Gulshan Rai at grai@mit.gov.in
More details here
We need a Netizen Rights Protection Commission/advisory body to ensure that the powers are not abused in course of time. More detailed discussion is available at http://www.naavi.org
Did you mean Chinese hat? They have more control over Internet and its traffic than the governance-challenged Talibans!!
But I believe this was necessary and over due for a long time. A medium like the Internet if left uncontrolled may definitely be misused, abused or used against easily, which is of course, happening rampantly.
One remote fear is conspiracy for control and polarization of news, coverage and opinions for the Internet as done for print and TV media. We already know how print and tv was (ab?)used during the 2009 assembly elections. This is not an impossible task as ‘The great firewall of China’ is successful to a some extent; I wouldn’t think this would happen to us, at least in near future.
And I guess many of us shouldn’t fear having our sites blocked; but the reasons mentioned are much valid and needed. Two more reasons I like to add are copyright infringement and privacy breach.
CERT India actually exists since long (www.cert-in.org.in), they are only talking of empowering them now.
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