India’s government has issued a stern warning to Meta, asserting that safe harbour protections will not cover child sexual abuse material violations and calling for more culturally sensitive moderation tools amid ongoing crackdown on harmful online content.
India’s government has told Meta that safe harbour protections will not shield people involved in child sexual abuse material violations, while stressing that its recent actions have stayed within the powers already available under Indian law, according to government sources cited by ANI. Officials have also urged the company to make its moderation systems more responsive to India’s linguistic and cultural context, rather than relying only on global enforcement standards.
The warning comes amid a sharper crackdown on unlawful content across Meta’s platforms. NDTV reported that India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology summoned Meta’s global leadership, including chief global affairs officer Joel Kaplan, to discuss concerns over public order and CSAM on the company’s services. The ministry has also sought a detailed explanation of how Meta’s systems and algorithms work, with possible consequences under Indian law if the platform fails to act against illegal material.
Meta has said it maintains a zero-tolerance approach to child exploitation content and uses artificial intelligence to detect and block it, according to NDTV’s reporting on the company’s response to the government’s notice over paid Instagram advertisements allegedly promoting access to CSAM. Government sources, however, say the platform must do more to filter unlawful material and should not depend on broad, one-size-fits-all moderation policies in a country with wide linguistic and social variation.
Officials also said the issue is not censorship but the prevention of online harm that could damage India’s social fabric. The Centre has separately argued that synthetically generated content should be clearly labelled so users can distinguish between authentic and artificial material. Similar concerns over the liability of digital platforms, accountability and harmful content have also been raised in other liberal democracies, underscoring that the challenge is not unique to India.
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