The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I&B) notified the Lok Sabha that the government is dedicated to guaranteeing that the Internet in India remains devoid of any unlawful content or information, especially vulgar and obscene material.

L Murugan, the Minister of State (MoS) for Information and Broadcasting and Parliamentary Affairs, provided a written response in the Lower House of Parliament to a question posed by Prabhakar Reddy Vemireddy during today's Lok Sabha session.

He also advised the House that the government is running a project on 'Information Security Education and Awareness (ISEA)' aimed at developing human resources in Information Security and fostering general awareness regarding different elements of cyber hygiene and cyber security among the public.

He stated that the Government's policies are focused on providing an Open, Safe, Trusted, and Accountable Internet for all its users, particularly for women and children.

"The government is dedicated to guaranteeing that the Internet in India remains free from all types of illegal content or information, specifically vulgar and obscene material," stated the MoS.

He mentioned that the Information Technology Act, 2000 (IT Act) and the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 (IT Rules) collectively establish a detailed framework to address illegal and harmful content in the digital realm and enforce specific responsibilities on intermediaries to maintain accountability.

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The IT Rules, 2021 imposes due-diligence requirements on intermediaries, such as social media intermediaries, to make reasonable efforts to ensure that users of their platforms do not host, display, upload, modify, publish, transmit, store, update, or share any information that is obscene, pornographic, pedophilic, harmful to children, intrusive to privacy, insulting, or harassing.

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If intermediaries fail to comply with the legal obligations set forth in the IT Rules, 2021, they forfeit their exemption from third party information as specified in section 79 of the IT Act. They are accountable for resulting actions or legal proceedings as stated under any existing legislation.

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On February 10 this year, the government enhanced the regulatory structure by revising the IT Rules to tackle issues stemming from synthetically generated information (SGI), such as deepfakes and AI-produced content.