Google’s transparency report, which reveals content removal requ-ests from the government during a specified period, shows there were 358 item-removal requests and 68 content removal requests from government agencies between January and June, of which 51 per cent removal requests were partially or fully complied with.
“We received requests from state and local law-enforcement agencies to remove YouTube videos that displayed protests against social leaders or used offensive language in reference to religious leaders. We declined the majority of these requests, and only locally restricted videos that appeared to violate local laws prohibiting speech, which could incite enmity between communities,” Google said. The search major also received a request from a local law-enforcement agency to remove 236 communities and profiles from its social network, Orkut concerning a local politician. “We did not comply with this request, since the content did not violate our community standards or local law,” Google said in its transparency report.
The report said 255 items on YouTube and Orkut were requested to be removed, since they were found criticising the government, while only one item on Google Maps was requested to be removed, citing national security.
| THE STORY SO FAR |
| September 2011: Govt asks firms like Yahoo!, Google and Facebook to handle objectionable content within 4 weeks |
| October 2011: Government shoots off letters to all sites, asking for their response |
| November 2011: IT secretary calls meeting of sites’ executives. Govt frames a code of conduct to handle objectionable content Internet firms said they had ‘orally’ given their consent to some of the clauses, but in writing, they backtracked |
| December 2011: Company executives tell telecom & IT minister Kapil Sibal US community standards would apply here Sibal asks for mechanism to ensure malcontent is removed as soon as it is noticed, failing which, the govt may take strict action |
Between January and June, there were 1,739 user data requests in which the government requested for disclosure of user data from Google accounts or services, and 2,439 user account access requests made to Google by the government and its agencies. Google claims it complied with 70 per cent of these requests. “The number of requests we receive for user account information as part of criminal investigations has increased year after year. The increase isn't surprising, since each year we offer more products and services, and we have a larger number of users. We review each request to make sure it complies with both the spirit and the letter of the law, and we may refuse to produce information or try to narrow the request in some cases,” Google said.
Social networks like Facebook, which have close to 35 million users in India, said they remove any content that violates their terms, which are designed to keep material that is hateful, threatening, incites violence or contains nudity off the service. “We recognise the government's interest in minimising the amount of abusive content available online and would continue to engage with the Indian authorities, as they debate this important issue,” Facebook said.
A Google spokesperson said the company was working to give people as much access to information as it could. “We follow the law when it comes to illegal content. And, even where content is legal but breaks our own terms and conditions, we take that down once we've been notified about it. But it also means when content is legal but controversial, we don't remove it because differing views should be respected, as long as they are legal,” the spokesperson said.
With inputs from Piyali Mandal