Digital Democracy

Three new legislations give the Union government power to censor news content, imperil encrypted communication, make it easier to shut down the internet, and intercept communications with minimal accountability. https://thewire.in/government/telecom-broadcasting-data-protection-bill-digipub 

These views were put forth by leading experts at a meeting organised on December 20 by Digipub, which represents over 60 digital news media, independent journalists and commentators.

According to the draft amendment, any news that has been identified as “fake” or false by the Press Information Bureau’s fact-checking unit or other Union government agencies will have to be taken down by all social media platforms. https://thewire.in/rights/motive-to-silence-critics-it-rules-draft-amendment-an-attempt-to-stifle-media-says-opposition 

The opposition parties have said that with this move, the Narendra Modi government wants to “silence its critics” through social and digital media platforms, which remain the last bastions to call its actions to account.

by Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar

21/01/2023

 Twitter’s recent filings with a third party database reveals that the Union ministry of information and broadcasting directed the social media platform to censor 50 tweets carrying a link to the new BBC documentary about the 2002 Gujarat communal violence citing legal grounds. The ministry cited Rule 16(3) of the IT Rules [PDF] and Section 69(A) of IT Act, 2000 to ask for removal of the posts. https://thewire.in/media/from-john-cusack-to-prashant-bhushan-modi-government-cites-emergency-to-censor-2002-riot-tweets 

22/01/2023

As Swartz fought for, what we ideally need is government information in the public domain and people’s personal data being secret.

https://thewire.in/tech/aaron-swartz-and-his-legacy-of-internet-activism 

Aaron Swartz died 10 years ago, driven to suicide by prosecutorial overreach of US attorneys trying to convict him for 35 years in jail for downloading scientific journals in bulk at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Swartz was a technology genius, who championed the cause of open knowledge and open internet. He helped create Rich Simple Site and Creative Commons, and was the co-founder of reddit and digital rights organisation Demand Progress. Beyond the technology contributions, Swartz helped liberate tons of information from government databases and create open access libraries and projects.

In Swartz’s words:

“Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves. The world’s entire scientific and cultural heritage, published over centuries in books and journals, is increasingly being digitised and locked up by a handful of private corporations. Want to read the papers featuring the most famous results of the sciences? You’ll need to send enormous amounts to publishers like Reed Elsevier.”

Across the world, at present, tech companies have taken over control of the information and internet infrastructure. They have co-opted words of internet communities to suit their narratives. In the name of openness and building Digital India, personal information has been commodified. This commodification of information is what Swartz was warning against, how the powerful are taking control of information that should belong to the people. People who understood this fought back against this very idea of gatekeepers of knowledge and information.

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by  Srinivas Kodali