The screenshot of a tweet has been doing the rounds on social media that all social media accounts need to be verified with a government ID through mobile phones within three months. These claims were circulated after the Government announced the Intermediary Guidelines & Digital Media Ethics Code Rules, 2021. These rules have been framed in exercise of powers under section 87 (2) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 and in supersession of the earlier Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines) Rules 2011.
After these rules were notified, tweets were posted on social media which claimed as follows.
“All SM accounts need to be verified with a government ID through mobile phones within three months. Welcome step. Internet is safer & more responsible now. Govt announces intermediary Guidelines & Digital Media Ethics Code Rules, 2021 to safeguard users’ rights. #ottguidelines”
The screenshot of the tweets doing the rounds are given below.
Let us check the veracity of the claims.
Official Press Release
On 25th February, 2021 the Press Information Bureau released a press statement stating that the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021 have been notified by the Government. The link of the press release can be accessed here. In the press release under the heading salient features it is clearly written that
- Voluntary User Verification Mechanism: Users who wish to verify their accounts voluntarily shall be provided an appropriate mechanism to verify their accounts and provided with demonstrable and visible mark of verification.
From the above statement it can be clearly deduced that the government has proposed only a voluntary verification mechanism and it is not mandatory for all users of social media to get their accounts verified.
Press Conference of Union Minister
The official account of the Press Information Bureau has also tweeted a video of Mr Ravi Shankar Prasad, Law & Justice, Communications, Electronics & Information Technology Minister of India, where he is clearly stating that only the social media users who wish to verify their accounts voluntarily shall be provided an appropriate mechanism to verify their accounts and will be provided with demonstrable and visible mark of verification. The video of the Union Minister can be accessed here.
Conclusion
Therefore, looking at the press release by PIB and the press conference of Union Minister, Ravi Shankar Prasad it can be safely said that rumours claiming that all social media accounts need to be verified by government IDs through mobile phones within three months are false.