Draft Rules on Blogging under IT (Amendment Act), 2008

As part of the rules to India’s Information Technology Amendment Act 2008, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology has proposed new regulations granting the Indian government indirect control over online content including blogging.

The rules define blog as “a type of website, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video” and bloggers as ‘users’. Such generic and vague definitions encompass a wide range of online publishers granting overreaching powers to the government to regulate personal blogs.

The criteria under which content can be blocked is further broadly defined including anything that can be deemed as ‘objectionable’, ‘harmful’, ‘disparaging’, ’causes annoyance or inconvenience to the addressee’, ‘security threats’, among others. These broadly defined terms raise serious concerns about the government’s powers to censor content, raising alarms about potential abuse and the impact on free expression.

Notification: due_dilligance4intermediary07_02_11