Edition 3: IT Parliamentary Committee's Short Meeting on Fake News on May 7
The May 7 meeting was truncated due to developments around Operation Sindoor
The parliamentary standing committee on communications and information technology met on May 7 to discuss the issue of fake news with officials from the MIB, and editors from news channels and newspapers including NDTV, Network18, India Today Group, Hindustan Times and Indian Express. Only introductory remarks were made in the meeting as parliamentarians, officials and editors had to focus on developments around Operation Sindoor that had commenced the previous night (May 6-7), at least four people aware of the matter said.
To be sure, this meeting was scheduled before Operation Sindoor took place and the discussion around fake news was not related to the subsequent deluge of misinformation that dominated the Indo-Pak armed conflict. The committee is chaired by BJP Lok Sabha MP Nishikant Dubey.
In the brief discussion on May 7, the news organisations submitted that despite its limitations, self-regulation of the news industry was still the best way forward, two people cited above said. Concerns were raised about the government’s attempts to define fake news.
At least one participant in the meeting said that media alone was not to be blamed for rampant misinformation. There was a short discussion about how the government itself indirectly supported misinformation, particularly on news channels, to build a certain narrative and image.
At least one news organisation said that technology companies were bigger culprits than news organisations in the spread of misinformation due to lack of accountability. While news channels, newspapers and digital news publishers must either be licensed by or registered with the MIB under different laws, social media users do not have to be similarly registered or licensed. In case of misinformation by a registered news organisation, its editors and reporters can be held accountable but no similar mechanism exists for social media users, this person said.
Algorithms online prioritise engagement to ramp up monetisation, one of the participants said. This person said that technology companies need to have processes to limit the spread of known disinformation and violent content and fact checks take time.
The Tech Trace has learnt that going forward, the committee will examine the role of technology companies in combatting mis/dis/mal-information.
(The parliamentary committee had previously discussed fake news on November 21, 2024. Read about it here.)
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