India: Bureaucratic Mafia Begin Their Policing: GSR529(E)

Message: 2
Date: Fri, 01 Aug 2003 02:59:00 -0000
From: "sachdeva_sameer" <sachdeva_sameer@yahoo.co.in>
Subject: Watch what you surf, Net police are here

Watch what you surf, Net police are here

MUMBAI: The thought police is gearing up to storm the virtual world.
In what appears to be its first serious attempt to monitor the
Internet, the Government of India has outlined an official procedure
for blocking websites.

An order issued by the department of information technology on July 7
enables a bunch of bureaucrats to decide the websites Indian surfers
are allowed to access.

``This is the first formal step towards Internet censorship in Indian
law,'' warns Somasekhar Sundaresan, a lawyer who specialises in
technology issues. ``The order provides the State with sweeping
powers to police Internet content. For example, news breaks such as
those in Tehelka.com can simply be blocked by the government using
these powers.''

Interestingly, the Information Technology Act, 2000, only provides
for the blocking of pornographic websites and the monitoring of
websites which endanger public order, the integrity and security of
the nation and relations with other countries.

But the new diktat goes a few steps further - permitting the blacking
out of ``websites promoting hate content, slander or defamation of
others, promoting gambling, promoting racism, violence and terrorism
and other such material, in addition to promoting pornography,
including child pornography and violent sex''.

The order - No. GSR529(E) - goes on to add: ``Blocking of such
websites may be equated to balanced flow of information and not
censorship.'' Critics, however, point out that much can be
accommodated under this umbrella clause.

According to the order, various agencies - including central and
state home departments, the courts, CBI, IB, police and the chairman
of the National Human Rights Commission - can submit a complaint to
the director of Cert-In, a new organisation which has been set up by
the government to address IT security issues.

This will then be examined by a committee comprising bureaucrats from
Cert-In, the department of information technology and the law or home
ministry. The committee will ``meet and take on the spot decision on
whether the website is to be blocked or not''. Neither the producers
of the website nor those with a contrary point of view are to be
given a hearing.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?
msid=105813

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