India mulls authorising more ministries to issue content takedown orders

The government is considering authorising some more ministries, including Defence, External Affairs, and Home Affairs, to issue content takedown orders to social media platforms, sources said on Wednesday.

Inter-ministerial discussions are currently underway, government sources said, but they did not provide a timeline for when this may be implemented.

At present, the Ministry of Electronics and IT (Meity) is the nodal ministry for takedowns and content blocking orders, and the latest move to expand the ambit of designated ministries would ensure that takedown orders can be issued faster on misleading, illegal content and AI-generated deepfakes.