17 January, 2019
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has sought to amend the Information Technology Act, 2000 (‘IT Act’) by way of the Information Technology (Amendment) Bill, 2018 (‘IT Bill’), which is expected to be introduced in the Parliament shortly. The IT Bill has been prepared in response to certain recent online phenomena such as the Blue Whale Challenge which induced several individuals (primarily children) in India and across the world to commit self-harm. It is sought to be introduced on the grounds that there exist several online games which involve violence and therefore have an undesirable effect on players and that much of the material available online denigrates the cultural values of India. The IT Bill seeks to introduce the following new provisions in the IT Act:
i. Publishing or transmitting any material repugnant to cultural ethos: Section 67BA is sought to be introduced which will penalise any person who publishes or transmits or causes to be published or transmitted in the electronic form, any material which ‘is repugnant to well established cultural ethos’. While the IT Bill does not define ‘cultural ethos’, it does provide that any material shall not be deemed to be against cultural ethos merely because it goes against or contradicts an established practice or custom.
ii. Hosting of dangerous online games: Section 67BB is sought to be introduced which will penalise hosting any online gaming resource which induces users to commit:
(a) dangerous acts harmful to themselves or others;
(b) acts with cause injury to themselves or others; and
(c) any illegal acts. Further, Section 79B is sought to be introduced which requires anyone that hosts online gaming resources or produces any storage media containing gaming resources to be sold offline, to ensure that:
(i) the game resource is categorised for use by appropriate age groups on the basis of content of the game; and
(ii) the game contains a mechanism that warns users against the repetition in real life of the dangerous acts depicted in the game (if any).
For further information, please contact:
Zia Mody, Partner, AZB & Partners
zia.mody@azbpartners.com
