"The order to block 240 escorts websites was issued to internet service providers on Monday on recommendations made by an expert committee under the Ministry of Home Affairs," an Information Technology ministry official said.
Senior advocate Arvind Datar, appearing for Twitter on Monday online, argued the company was following the rules laid out in the Information Technology Act.
Cricket icon Sachin Tendulkar will now get an opportunity to examine issues related to information technology. The Rajya Sabha MP has been included in the Standing Committee on Information and Technology.
The salient features of the new OTT/social media policy announced by the Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad and Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar on February 25, 2021.
The action was taken under Section 69A of the Act that empowers the government to block any information generated, transmitted, received, stored or hosted in any computer resource in the interest of sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of the state, friendly relations with foreign states or public order or for preventing incitement to the commission of any cognisable offence.
Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur, addressing over 100 communication officers of the government, stressed on the importance of reaching out to all sections of the society, particularly the underprivileged.
Around $200 million worth of deposits of Indian start-ups have been withdrawn from Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), which was taken over by US banking regulators last week after it collapsed, and moved to the Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT City) IFSC, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, minister of state (MoS) for electronics and information technology said on Thursday. "It turns out that there was over a billion dollars of deposits of Indian start-ups in SVB. "The existential, solvency crisis that was there six-seven days ago has become much more manageable, even the short-term liquidity crisis is being addressed as the bank allows access to deposits," the minister said while speaking at Lenovo's Tech World India Edition event.
While Facebook said on Tuesday it will publish an interim report on July 2 as mandated by the IT rules, Google will publish its transparency report as required under the new IT Rules in India.
The government has identified nine key focus areas in the AI national programme, including agriculture, education, Indian languages, smart cities, cybersecurity, transportation, and finance.
Asked about action taken against those spreading fake news, and publishers of anti-national material, he said more than 60 accounts have been blocked including those on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
The government on Thursday tweaked curbs on imports of laptops and computers as it allowed importers to bring in shipments of IT hardware from overseas on a mere 'authorisation' upon detailing quantity and value. The new 'import management system' is aimed at monitoring shipments of laptops, tablets and computers into the country without hurting market supply or creating a cumbersome licensing regime. The announcement is likely to provide relief to companies in the IT hardware segment in India as they had flagged concerns over the imposition of a strict licensing regime for importers.
The 'Indira Gandhi award for best debut film' and the 'Nargis Dutt award for best feature film on national integration' have been retitled with the names of the late prime minister and legendary actor being dropped as part of a raft of changes for the National Film Awards, according to a notification.
While asserting that the CoWIN portal is completely safe with adequate safeguards for data privacy, it said an internal exercise has been initiated to review the existing security measures of CoWIN.
The ministry has said the information is classified as 'top secret' and it cannot be disclosed.
These banned clones include Tiktok Lite, Helo Lite, SHAREit Lite, BIGO LIVE Lite and VFY Lite. The order regarding the ban on these apps came on Friday, July 24.
The SFJ pushed for Sikh Referendum 2020 as part of its separatist agenda. It openly espouses the cause of Khalistan and in that process challenges the sovereignty and territorial integrity of India, another official said.
Although the credit for acquiring the technological skill must be given to India's outstanding nuclear scientists, the decision to go nuclear was a political one that entailed clarity of vision, courage and resolve, points out Rup Narayan Das.
Besides representatives of Facebook, the committee has asked representatives of the ministry of electronics and information technology to remain present on September 2 to discuss on the subject of "safeguarding citizens' rights and prevention of misuse of social/online news media platforms including special emphasis on women security in the digital space".
The political slugfest has been going on between the two, which started after Tharoor's announcement that the panel would like to hear from Facebook about the report published in Wall Street Journal claiming that the social media platform ignored applying its hate-speech rules to politicians of the ruling party in India.
The government has asked social media companies to immediately remove any content from their platform that uses or refers to the term 'Indian variant' of coronavirus, to curb misinformation around COVID-19, sources said Friday.
The Delhi high court on Tuesday closed proceedings in a petition alleging non-compliance of new IT Rules by Twitter, saying that 'nothing remained' in view of the central government being satisfied with the micro-blogging platform appointing a chief compliance officer (CCO), resident grievance officer (RGO) and nodal contact person.
Zuckerberg is expected to speak for 15 minutes.
Journalists acting in a manner prejudicial to the country's "security, sovereignty and integrity" as well as "public order, decency or morality" will lose their government accreditation, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has said in its new guidelines.
The videos of the perfume brand Layer Shot sparked outrage among a large section of social media users, who claimed the advertisement sought to promote sexual violence against women.
Facebook had collected certificates from both the firms in 2016-17 that data collected by them using "thisisyourdigitallife" was accounted for and destroyed.
India has voiced deep concern over the deteriorating security situation and large-scale loss of civilian life in the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict, urging the parties to work towards creating conditions necessary for peace and restarting direct negotiations through de-escalation and ending violence.
According to official sources, various states are contemplating bans on TikTok, Kwai, LIKE and other such apps over the next few months, on the worry that these platforms encourage child pornography, nudity and the spread of fake news, report Karan Choudhury and Neha Alawadhi.
All those who live and work in India will have to abide by the rules of the country, newly sworn-in Information and Technology Minister Ashwini Vaishnav said on Thursday on Twitter's standoff with the central government over new IT rules.
Around 8 IT firms have withdrawn from partnering 11 out of the 20 IIITs, says govt.
Dominic Xavier wonders why two government departments say they have no idea about who created the Aarogya Sethu app.
Irani's deputy in the I&B ministry Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore has been given the charge of the key portfolio.
The Manufacturers'Association for Information Technology has presented a memorandum to the ministry of finance, for growth-oriented measures to boost domestic manufacturing.
Google's chief privacy officer, Keith Enright, has warned policymakers that frequent and large-scale sharing of citizen data, even if anonymized, can damage users' privacy. Pointing to research that shows data sets lose their anonymity if shared consistently over time, he said: "I would encourage policymakers and companies to be extremely circumspect while proceeding in that direction." Anonymization is a technique that removes or modifies personally identifiable information, resulting in data that cannot be associated with any one individual.
The parliamentary panel on information technology will question government officials on allegations relating to suspected phone tapping of politicians, journalists and others using Pegasus spyware, the committee chairman and senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor said on Tuesday, and asserted that it is the "most important issue" for many members.
Senior bureaucrat Pradip Kumar Tripathi has been appointed as secretary (coordination) in the Cabinet Secretariat as part of a major bureaucratic reshuffle effected by the Centre on Monday.
The Income-tax department has conducted searches at multiple premises of Chinese telecom company Huawei in the country as part of a tax evasion investigation, official sources said on Wednesday. The raids were launched at the company's premises in Delhi, Gurugram (Haryana) and Bengaluru in Karnataka on Tuesday. Sources said the officials looked at financial documents, account books and company records as part of a tax evasion investigation against the company, its Indian businesses and overseas transactions.
Unlike Israeli company NSO, whose sale of Pegasus cyber tech grabbed worldwide attention, and other manufacturers of offensive-cyber products, Cellebrite operates in a grey area between security exports and civilian ones.
Home-grown companies, including electronics manufacturing services (EMS) firm Dixon Technologies and mobile device maker Lava International, have started exploratory talks with Chinese sub-assemblies and component players for setting up joint ventures (JVs) in the country. Sources in the industry say many domestic companies have also had preliminary discussions with original design manufacturers (ODMs) in China to look at a JV model for manufacturing smartphones. Key ODM players in mobile devices in China include Longcheer, Huaqin, and Wingtech, which has already set up a plant in Tirupati.
Arshdeep Singh has incurred the wrath of social media users since Sunday when he dropped a catch in the closing stages of a tense India-Pakistan match.
The Centre told the Supreme Court on Tuesday a new data protection bill is ready and will be introduced in the monsoon session of Parliament in July, as the apex court heard a matter related to privacy concerns of social media users.
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