Intermediary Liability – An Explanation

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Definitions and Explanations – the Concept of ‘Incentives’

An intermediary is an internet-based service provider, which provides its users with a platform to upload all and any types of content, ranging from text to videos. Some of the more popular examples of intermediaries would be Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, WordPress and Blogspot. The term ‘intermediary’ is defined under the Information Technology Act (‘IT Act’) as follows: “ “intermediary”, with respect to any particular electronic records, means any person who on behalf of another person receives, stores or transmits that record or provides any service with respect to that record and includes telecom service providers, network service providers, internet service providers, web-hosting service providers, search engines, online payment sites, online-auction sites, online-market places and cyber cafes”.

Now, the reason why these intermediaries offer the services they do is simple – they want to make a profit. But isn’t the use of such a service an excercise of the Right to Freedom of Speech by its users?

On Kill Switches, Media Silence, and Governmental Super-Powers – A Comment on Vadodara

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The following is a post on the recent disconnection of mobile internet, bulk SMS and bulk MMS services by the government in Vadodara in light of social unrest and riots. It’s a bit of a long post, and therefore has been divided into sections – the first part details the factual background of the issue, the second part contrasts it with Hong Kong, the third part considers the legal perspective, and the final two parts are my comments on it. My sincere thanks to Swaraj Paul Barooah for his helpful comments on the post.

Background

In the past week, two very different cities have found themselves in the midst of social upheaval, and both of these cities have dealt with it in two very different ways. One is Hong Kong, and the other is our very own Vadodara.