Govt likely to launch social media grievance portal within a week

The idea is to create avenues for redressing user grievances against online platforms apart from courts

The government may launch the portal for filing complaints against online platforms, including social media companies, within a week, according to sources. The three panels for solving the grievances have already been established.
 
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) on Saturday notified three grievance appellate committees (GACs), according to the recently amended Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 (IT Rules, 2021).
 
Rajesh Kumar, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), Ministry of Home Affairs; Vikram Sahay, Joint Secretary in charge of the Policy and Administration Division in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting; and Kavita Bhatia, a scientist in the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology will head the committees as chairperson ex officio.

 

The committees will be fully operational only from March 1 due to the time required for technical arrangements and the requests of intermediaries for a transition period.
 
The committees will operate as virtual platforms wherein the entire appeal process (from filing of appeal to the decision of the panel) will be conducted digitally. The panels will endeavour to address the user’s appeal within 30 days. Periodic reviews of GACs, and reporting and disclosures of GAC orders will also be part of the process. The appeals can be made on https://www.gac.gov.in, which is likely to get activated in the coming week.

 
The IT rules, 2021, require significant social media intermediaries — platforms with more than five million users — to appoint a resident grievance officer to decide on content-related complaints. In June, the MeitY proposed a GAC, which could override the decisions of grievance officers. In the following public consultations on the amendment, big tech companies had expressed reservations about GACs.
 
According to the rules, the internet intermediaries must comply with every order passed by the GAC, and a report to that effect shall be uploaded on its website. According to official sources, the scope of each committee will be classified according to the type of grievances it may deal with.

 
“The need for GAC was created due to large numbers of grievances being left unaddressed or unsatisfactorily addressed by Internet Intermediaries. GAC is expected to create a culture of responsiveness amongst all Internet Platforms and Intermediaries towards their consumers,” the ministry said in a press note. It added that the government has interacted with major social media intermediaries while designing the panels.