'Sahyog' Portal Developed For Cooperation Of Govts & Social Media Intermediaries In Creating Safe Cyberspace: MHA To Delhi High Court

The Union Ministry of Home Affairs has recently informed the Delhi High Court that it has developed a portal called “SAHYOG” where authorised agencies of Central Government, States and Union Territories as well as the social media intermediaries will work together to create a safe cyberspace.The report filed by the MHA states that in the first phase of the portal, the focus has been on taking down unlawful content and that the portal's functionality will be extended in the second phase to include lawful data requests and other similar submissions.The report was perused by a division bench comprising of Justice Prathiba M Singh and Justice Amit Sharma while dealing with a habeas corpus plea filed by a mother seeking direction on the Delhi Police to produce her 19 year old son who has been missing since January 10. The Delhi Police had written to Meta Platforms on September 06 regarding some information relating to an Instagram account of the missing boy.The MHA's report further said that the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) is the nodal agency dealing with cyber crime complaints and for coordination with all the intermediaries.“However, the significant aspect of this report is the development of the portal called 'SAHYOG'. The said portal is currently stated to be on a pilot run. According to the report, this portal will be the main portal on which all the authorised agencies of Central Government, States and UTs, social media intermediaries and IT intermediaries will have joint access,” the bench noted. It directed all the social media intermediaries having any technical or other issues to resolve the same in a meeting with I4C to be held on a convenient date in close coordination.The Bench also directed that a meeting be held with the Delhi Police for enabling preparation of a handbook that may be utilised by the Investigating Officers (IOs) for timely furnishing of information requested by them from social media platforms.The matter will now be heard on January 30, 2025. Earlier, the Bench had directed social media platforms like Google, Meta, WhatsApp etc to produce their SOPs on dealing with information requests of the law enforcement agencies. Title: SHABANA v. GOVT OF NCT OF DELHI AND ORS.Citation: 2024 LiveLaw (Del) 1356Click here to read order

'Sahyog' Portal Developed For Cooperation Of Govts & Social Media Intermediaries In Creating Safe Cyberspace: MHA To Delhi High Court

Nupur Thapliyal

Tags