Ravi Shankar Prasad praises Google, Facebook for compliance with new Indian IT rules

Facebook took down over 30 million content pieces across 10 violation categories and Instagram took action against about two million pieces across nine categories during May 15-June 15 in the country, the social media giant said in its maiden monthly compliance report as mandated by the Indian IT rules, according to a report in the media.

Search engine Google removed 59,350 links from its products, including YouTube.

Indian micro-blogging site Koo said it has acted on 1,253 of the 5,502 complaints.

"Nice to see significant social media platforms like Google, Facebook and Instagram following the new IT Rules. First compliance report on voluntary removal of offensive posts published by them as per IT Rules is a big step towards transparency," Ravi Shankar Prasad tweeted today.

Facebook said its next report will be released on July 15 with details of user complaints received and action taken.

The July 15 report will also contain data related to WhatsApp, which is part of Facebook's family of apps.

According to the new rules, major social media companies like Facebook and Twitter are required to appoint a grievance officer, a nodal officer and a chief compliance officer, all based in India.

The new rules also call for companies to follow greater due diligence, take down content flagged as offensive within 36 hours and  trace the "first originator" of any information found to undermine the sovereignty of India, the security of the state, or public order.

In case of non-compliance the social media platforms will lose their status as 'intermediaries' and will be held responsible for all the content published on their platforms, making them liable to face criminal action.