The Delhi High Court, on Friday, came down heavily on social networking sites, Google and Facebook, for their failure in restraining minors to open account on their sites. While granting three-week time, the court asked them to spell out their mechanism to address the complaints pertaining to obscenity and impersonation of accounts or any offensive content.
Earlier during the hearing, annoyed by Google's refusal to put the statement saying "Children below 13 years cannot open an account on the site", Acting Chief Justice BD Ahmed said, "We are in India. Just because we're not tough with you, you're not doing it."
"What do you (Google and Facebook) do when you know there are underage users or groups created by minors on the sitesIJ" asked the division bench of Justice BD Ahmed and Justice Vibhu Bakhru and re-notified the matter for August 23.
"let's see how they deal with the complaints," said the bench while asking about the complaints redressal system of Google Inc and Facebook, after it was told by petitioner's counsel Virag Gupta that both the social networking sites did not have a mechanism to address the complaints against offensive content.
Google Inc, however, submitted before the court that they have a mechanism in place to address violation of their terms and conditions. "We have always had a mechanism to remove objectionable content using the feature 'report abuse'. A mere click on this feature can lead to the elimination of the content," said the counsel appearing for Google Inc. In its defence, Google said that its terms and conditions page can be accessed from every page on the site which cautions users from indulging in unethical practices.
The Central Government also filed an affidavit after it was pulled up regarding laws in India for protection of children on social media.
"There is no specific law in India regarding protection of children on social networking sites, but the consultation process has been put in place and relevant committees have been set up to look into the issue," said Rajiv Mehra, Additional Solicitor General.
While blaming the website for non-compliance of certain guidelines issued by the Government, Mehra said, "They (Google and Facebook) are not following the intermediary guidelines and do not respond to the complaints on time." The petition was filed by former BJP ideologue KN Govindacharya.