Remove all 'pornographic and obscene' content in a week: NCW to Twitter

A "deeply perturbed" National Commission for Women (NCW) on Wednesday asked Twitter to remove "all pornographic and obscene" content from its platform within a week while instructing Delhi Police to investigate and take appropriate legal action.

The NCW move comes a day after Delhi Police registered a case against Twitter for child pornographic content following a complaint by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR).

Delhi Police on Wednesday also sought details of accounts circulating child sexual abuse content on the platform from Twitter, which said it has "zero-tolerance policy for Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE)" and it would continue to invest in "proactive detection and removal of content that violates Twitter rules and work with law enforcement and NGO partners in India to tackle the issue".

Taking suo motu cognisance of several profiles on Twitter sharing pornographic content, officials said, NCW Chairperson Rekha Sharma wrote to Twitter India Managing Director Manish Maheshwari to immediately remove "all such" content from the micro-blogging site within a week.

The NCW wrote to the Delhi Police Commissioner to "investigate and take appropriate legal action in the matter".

It has also shared with Twitter details of seven profiles sharing pornographic content on its platform, saying it is "deeply perturbed" about the existence of such handles on Twitter. The micro-blogging site has been given 10 days to submit an action taken report.

Sources said the NCW had last week asked Twitter to take necessary action after receiving a complaint about pornographic content on its platform. "However, no action was reportedly taken by the platform," it said.

In a statement, the NCW said, the Commission is "disturbed with the fact that despite knowing the availability of such banned content which not only violates Indian laws but also Twitter's own policy, no action has been taken till date towards removing them".

Twitter has been facing trouble in the recent past with police in at least three states registering cases against Twitter after it is said to have lost the protection from criminal cases as it is not following the latest Information and Technology rules.

There are two cases in Uttar Pradesh while Madhya Pradesh and Delhi have filed FIRs against it. One each FIR has been registered in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh on charges of hosting a distorted map of India on its website while UP Police has also registered a case in connection with a video of an elderly man being attacked. The fourth case is the one on child pornography on Twitter.

In its response on Wednesday, a Twitter spokesperson said it has a "zero-tolerance policy for Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE). We will continue to invest in proactive detection and removal of content that violates Twitter rules and work with law enforcement and NGO partners in India to tackle the issue."

Twitter has said it has a zero-tolerance policy for child sexual exploitation and has incorporated special tools to detect and remove content linked to child pornography and the accounts linked to it.

On the registration of case by Delhi Police on NCPCR complaint, it has said, "viewing, sharing, or linking to child sexual exploitation (CSE) material, regardless of the intent, contributes to the re-victimization of the depicted children and is prohibited on our service."

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