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!![Pirates Discuss] Sarbajit - on 66a ITAct ITRules, etc
Sarbajit Roy <sroy.mb@gmail.com> Tue, Nov 27, 2012 at 10:18 PM
To: General discussions <discuss@lists.pirateparty.org.in>

Vidyut

Lets get the CIS thing out of the way first in this post,otherwise it will clutter our 66A debate.

I'll make very short statements.

I don't see how anyone who studies what I post can say I favour any form of censorship. Not true ! you won't find a more outspoken person than me or someone who allows even my worst critics to post as-is on lists I moderate.

The IT Intermediary Guidelines Rules 2011 (and I stress 'Rules') lay down a regime for taking down unsatisfactory content. They have many inherent safeguards for individual bloggers / authors. They were notified after following a full procedure in which CIS actively participated (and I did not - I had exited the IT space in 2009).

Certain vested interests (like search engines which derive massive ad revenues by placing ads which are illegal in India law - porn/liquor etc) had problems with these rules.

They orchestrated a campaign through CIS to get these Rules diluted. CIS prepared a fake survey which supposedly showed that sites (they initially suppressed that these were search engines) were taking down "links" when private takedown complaints were made to them.

CIS then used this fake study to run a media scare campaign to get Parliament to amend the Rules which supposedly allowed any private person to get any material taken down on the internet.

Pranesh posted on Arun's list - still the most respected IT list - asking for support.

In the discussion the identity of CIS's major patron emerged. Their study was found to be connected to specific terms on search engines. Their own study showed that 2 out of the 7 sites refused to take down the material and gave it back to them.

My case was that the IT ITGR posed no threat to individuals. I informed Arun's list that I would use the same Rules to see if Online Gambling sites with .IN (ie. amenable to Indian Laws) could be taken down. many people on Arun's list with .IN domains were getting worried by the nonsense CIS was posting.

I went through a full campaign to get some sites taken down, with all guns blazing involving cyber cell. NIXI registry, Go Daddy and everything. Not even 1 site could be taken down. FYI. The sites I went after were .IN online gamblin g sites owned by Indians with accurate addresses and working phone lines in India. (<-- nothing easier than this)

In other words, CIS was lying !!!

Yes, if you are a blogger on a platform like Blogger/Blogpsot or Wordpress or whatever you are subject to THEIR T&Cs.but that is nothing to do with Indian IT Laws. They are simply playing the numbers by preventing small problems from escalating into big ones.

If you get a takedown notice for something you have written which is hosted on your own website/domain, you can usually ignore them or ask them to take a hike. Of course file sharing, kiddie porn, IPR vios are something else.

There are no unfettered internet censorship laws. Please show me one. 66A is not a censorship law. I'll get into that separately, if you explain to me why you think it is a censorship law.

Sarbajit