3-Tier Checks for OTTs

Context- Recently, the government has prepared draft rules to regulate all social media, streaming or OTT (over the top) platforms and news-related websites.

Rationale behind the step

• Countries, including India, have felt the need to regulate social media companies, which are not responsible for the content, unlike traditional media firms.
• There have also been demands to regulate content on OTT and social media platforms, with some shows on these running into trouble for offending religious sentiments.

• Absence of censorship has been grossly misused in the name of creative  expression on digital platforms.
• The OTT platforms are profit-driven and provide access to content by charging a subscription fee.

About

• In the document, titled Information Technology (Guidelines for Intermediaries and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, the government cites powers provided to it under section 87 of the Information Technology Act, 2000
  • This section allows the government to make rules to carry out the provisions of the law by notification in the Official Gazette and in the Electronic Gazette.
• The draft contains a three-tier regulatory mechanism for regulation of all online media
  • The first tier of the regulatory mechanism is grievance redressal by the company itself, and the second level involves a Press Council of India-like regulatory body that will be headed by a retired judge of a high court or the Supreme Court.
  • The third-tier will comprise an inter-ministerial committee and will be headed by a joint secretary-level officer from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
    • In effect, in addition to the IT ministry, this committee would also recommend blocks or takedowns

Key Highlights

• Social media companies may need to appoint officers who will be responsible for complying with content moderation orders.
• The rules also say that competent authorities, through an order, may demand pertinent information for the purposes of prevention, detection, investigation, prosecution or punishment of crimes.
  • However, It excludes the intermediary from having to disclose the content of the personal messages.

• The rules mandate the creation of a grievance redressal portal as the central repository for receiving and processing all grievances.
• They ask intermediaries to act on certain kinds of violations within 24 hours, and on all concerns of a complainant within 15 days.

About OTT platforms

• OTT, or over-the-top platforms, are audio and video hosting and streaming services that started out as content hosting platforms, but soon branched out into the production and release of short movies, feature films, documentaries and web-series themselves.
• These platforms offer a range of content and use artificial intelligence to suggest to users the content they are likely to view based on their past viewership on the platform.
• Most OTT platforms generally offer some content for free and charge a monthly subscription fee for premium content which is generally unavailable elsewhere.
• The premium content is usually produced and marketed by the OTT platform themselves, in association with established production houses that historically have made feature films.

 OTT platforms in India

• There are currently 40 OTT platforms operating in India.
• The government as the first step towards regulation, amended the “allocation of Business Rules” in November last year bringing all online platforms under the mandate of the I&B Ministry and all platforms were told to register with the Ministry.
  • The central government’s move to bring the OTT platforms under the I&B Ministry could also mean that these platforms would have to apply for certification and approval of the content they wish to stream.

• The laws regulating OTT platforms
  • In India, there are no laws or rules regulating OTT platforms as it is a relatively new medium of entertainment.
  • The regulation of such platforms has been widely debated and discussed therefore the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI), a representative body of the OTT platforms has developed a self-regulatory model.
  • On examination, it was felt that the mechanism proposed by IAMAI did not give adequate cognizance to content prohibited under law and there were issues of conflict of interest, which were communicated to IAMAI in September 2020.
  • The Online Curated Content Providers or OCCPs had also proposed a Digital Curated Content Complaints Council along with the self-regulatory mechanism as a part of its proposed two-tier structure.
• The proposal, however, was shot down by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, which will now oversee these platforms.

Source :HT