News Analysis India

Tag: Facebook

  • Meta says India ‘most significant’ country for all new things across its platforms

    By PTI

    NEW DELHI: India is the ‘most significant’ country for Meta in terms of all the new things that feature across its platforms — Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, a top company official said.

    Meta has also provided a great opportunity for numerous brands and millions of creators to express their creativity and build audiences in India through short-form videos, said Manish Chopra, Director and Head of Partnerships for Facebook India (Meta).

    “India is a very critical market for our platforms from multiple dimensions. A lot of new product learning and incubation is done here, and ‘Reels’ is an example of that….this is the market where we have done the most amount of testing of new product features.”

    “India is the most significant market where the focus is for all the new things that we are doing across Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp,” he told PTI.

    Chopra was speaking on the sidelines of Meta’s annual ‘Creator Day’, which was recently held for the first time in Kolkata.

    The event celebrates creators and gives them a chance to create, collaborate and learn from each other, he said.READ | Longest outage: WhatsApp services being restored after almost two hours of disruptions

    Chopra said ‘Reels’ (short-form videos), which were launched two years back, have gained massive popularity in India, including tier-2 and tier-3 cities. “India is the lighthouse country for ‘Reels’ for Meta globally. As per a new research report, around 200 million people are spending about 45 mins per day on short-form videos, and this figure is estimated to go up to 600 million people.”

    “Reels is helping creators express their creativity, and passion, and build audiences and followers that relate with them through the content,” he said.

    Short-form videos have also become a potent medium for brands to promote their products on Facebook and Instagram, the official said.

    ‘Reels’ provide a different and authentic kind of voice for brands to engage with users, he said.

    “Digital advertising is a highly performing means for brands (large and small). It’s an efficient way to grow. In India, more than 50 per cent of the followers for the businesses that are on Instagram are coming from tier-2 and tier-3 cities; so a company can reach out to these markets by being on Instagram and Facebook,” Chopra said.MAGAZINE SPECIAL | Facebook crisis: Zucker Punched!He also said that a lot of music trends have been happening through short-form videos, as artistes make use of the ‘1 Minute Music’ format on Instagram to get “tremendous” distribution.

    “We believe that cricket, Bollywood and music define a lot of culture in India. So, we continue to invest closely with partners who create these IPs (intellectual property),” he said.

    Meta had recently announced a partnership with the ICC that would enable people to watch the best match moments and highlights of the Men’s T20 World Cup, through clips on ‘Reels’ on Instagram and Facebook.

    On fake profiles and the spread of misinformation on Meta platforms, Chopra said the tech conglomerate takes constant measures to rein in such menace.

    “Putting a check on fake profiles and spread of misinformation is a constant area of investment for us. We are proactively taking down millions of fake accounts, and have a large organisation that ensures we are responding appropriately to complaints. We also help users become more secure about their own accounts through new security features,” he said.

    NEW DELHI: India is the ‘most significant’ country for Meta in terms of all the new things that feature across its platforms — Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, a top company official said.

    Meta has also provided a great opportunity for numerous brands and millions of creators to express their creativity and build audiences in India through short-form videos, said Manish Chopra, Director and Head of Partnerships for Facebook India (Meta).

    “India is a very critical market for our platforms from multiple dimensions. A lot of new product learning and incubation is done here, and ‘Reels’ is an example of that….this is the market where we have done the most amount of testing of new product features.”

    “India is the most significant market where the focus is for all the new things that we are doing across Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp,” he told PTI.

    Chopra was speaking on the sidelines of Meta’s annual ‘Creator Day’, which was recently held for the first time in Kolkata.

    The event celebrates creators and gives them a chance to create, collaborate and learn from each other, he said.READ | Longest outage: WhatsApp services being restored after almost two hours of disruptions

    Chopra said ‘Reels’ (short-form videos), which were launched two years back, have gained massive popularity in India, including tier-2 and tier-3 cities. “India is the lighthouse country for ‘Reels’ for Meta globally. As per a new research report, around 200 million people are spending about 45 mins per day on short-form videos, and this figure is estimated to go up to 600 million people.”

    “Reels is helping creators express their creativity, and passion, and build audiences and followers that relate with them through the content,” he said.

    Short-form videos have also become a potent medium for brands to promote their products on Facebook and Instagram, the official said.

    ‘Reels’ provide a different and authentic kind of voice for brands to engage with users, he said.

    “Digital advertising is a highly performing means for brands (large and small). It’s an efficient way to grow. In India, more than 50 per cent of the followers for the businesses that are on Instagram are coming from tier-2 and tier-3 cities; so a company can reach out to these markets by being on Instagram and Facebook,” Chopra said.MAGAZINE SPECIAL | Facebook crisis: Zucker Punched!
    He also said that a lot of music trends have been happening through short-form videos, as artistes make use of the ‘1 Minute Music’ format on Instagram to get “tremendous” distribution.

    “We believe that cricket, Bollywood and music define a lot of culture in India. So, we continue to invest closely with partners who create these IPs (intellectual property),” he said.

    Meta had recently announced a partnership with the ICC that would enable people to watch the best match moments and highlights of the Men’s T20 World Cup, through clips on ‘Reels’ on Instagram and Facebook.

    On fake profiles and the spread of misinformation on Meta platforms, Chopra said the tech conglomerate takes constant measures to rein in such menace.

    “Putting a check on fake profiles and spread of misinformation is a constant area of investment for us. We are proactively taking down millions of fake accounts, and have a large organisation that ensures we are responding appropriately to complaints. We also help users become more secure about their own accounts through new security features,” he said.

  • Man arrested in Uttar Pradesh’s Ballia for objectionable Facebook post on Prophet Mohammad

    By PTI

    BALLIA: A youth has been arrested in Rasra area here for allegedly posting an objectionable content against Prophet Mohammad on a social media site, a police official said on Monday.

    Krishna Kumar, who had posted the objectionable Facebook post on Sunday, was arrested, Circle Officer (Rasra) Shiv Narain Vaish said.

    The case has been registered against him on the complaint of Sheikh Huzaifa, a member of Jamiat Ulama, who in a tweet on Sunday urged the police to take action against the accused.

    Taking cognizance of the complaint, police on Monday arrested Krishna Kumar, the CO added.

  • Amid Prophet remarks row, two arrested in UP’s Bhadohi over ‘objectionable’, ‘inciting’ Facebook posts

    By PTI

    BHADOHI: Two people were arrested on Sunday in Bhadohi district on charges of ‘inciting religious sentiments’ through Facebook posts, police here said.

    According to Superintendent of Police Dr Anil Kumar, one Chaudhary Azhar, a resident of Suryawa Police Station area, had made some “caste-specific” posts on Facebook against Nupur Sharma after some people took out a procession in her support on Saturday.

    Durgesh Singh, the second accused, from Kotwali area, had also made a post on the same site “hurting the religious sentiments of a particular community,” he said.

    The SP said that police took note of the posts made by the two men and booked them under relevant sections.

    He also appealed to the general public to avoid making objectionable remarks on social media and maintain peace, warning them of “strict legal action” if they do otherwise.

    People in Gopiganj Police Station area of the district had taken out a procession in support of Nupur Sharma, a former spokesperson of Bharatiya Janata Party, on Saturday evening.

    Police have registered an FIR against 46 people in this matter for violation of Section 144, the SP said.

    Eleven people have been named in this FIR and 35 are unidentified persons – all of whom are alleged to have participated in the procession.

    Police is in the process of initiating their arrest, the senior police officer added.

  • Parl panel to summon Google, Twitter, Amazon, other big tech firms to discuss their competitive conduct

    By PTI

    NEW DELHI: With a number of global tech giants facing CCI probe for alleged anti-competitive practices, a key Parliamentary panel on Thursday decided to summon representatives of Google, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter and others to examine their competitive behaviour.

    The next meeting of the panel on the issue is likely to be held on May 12. The issue was discussed in detail by members of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance after a presentation was made before it by the Competition Commission of India (CCI).

    The regulator told the panel that it was setting up a ‘Digital Markets and Data Unit’ for effectively dealing with anti-competition practices of big tech companies and bringing a new bill to amend the CCI Act.

    CCI also cited a number of investigations it is carrying out in the digital space, including those against Google, Facebook-WhatsApp, Apple, Amazon, Flipkart, MakeMyTrip-Goibibo, Swiggy and Zomato.

    The meeting also comes against the backdrop of mounting concerns globally, including in India, about alleged practices of big tech players and technology platforms that could be adversely impacting competition in the market place.

    About the meeting, the panel’s Chairman Jayant Sinha told PTI that it had “an excellent set of discussions” with officials from the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and Competition Commission of India.

    “In our next hearing (on this issue), we will be calling most of the major tech companies to hear their perspective and how competition law in India is evolving to address the needs and challenges associated with digital space. All of the major companies we are going to invite. Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, Microsoft and others. Competition laws is evolving across the world to meet the challenges associated with the digital markets,” Sinha said.

    Sinha, a BJP leader and a former Union minister, said the panel will discuss about competitive behaviour of these companies.

    According to sources, BJP member CM Ramesh raised the issue of cartelisation among cement companies with the CCI officials and their response on the matter is expected in the next meeting. Besides, the panel discussed about the existing competition law.

    According to Sinha, the CCI Act was initiated in 2002 and last amended in 2007.

    A bill to amend the Act is also underway wherein provisions are likely to be introduced to deal with anti-competition practices of tech giants, CCI told the panel.

    “It has been 15 years since substantial amendments have been made to our competition law.”

    “With the rise of digital markets and the importance of the digital economy for the India’s economic growth and global position, it is very important to look at our competition law to see whether it is the equal to those in the advanced jurisdictions like the European Union, United States, Australia and United Kingdom,” Sinha said.

    According to him, today’s discussions were to assess how the competition law is evolving and what else is required to position it for the future.

    “We as a committee are examining what direction our competition law should evolve to meet these requirements,” he noted.

    In the presentation, CCI also said that it was strengthening its institutional capacity, recalibrating the competition law regime, observing global developments in big tech and monitoring technological developments in digital markets.

  • End Facebook’s ‘systematic interference’ in India’s democracy: Sonia Gandhi

    By PTI

    NEW DELHI: Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Wednesday urged the government to put an end to the alleged “systematic interference” of Facebook and other social media giants in India’s electoral politics.

    Making a Zero Hour submission in the Lok Sabha, Gandhi referred to a report published in Al Jazeera and The Reporters’ Collective claiming that Facebook had offered BJP cheaper deals for election advertisements as compared to other political parties.

    “I urge the government to put an end to the systematic interference and influence of Facebook and other social media giants in the electoral politics of the world’s largest democracy. This is beyond partisan politics. We need to protect democracy and social harmony regardless of who is in power,” she said.

  • Meta vows to combat misinformation, hate speech on platform as states head for polls

    By PTI

    NEW DELHI: Facebook-parent Meta on Thursday said it will be activating its Elections Operations Center to watch out for potential abuses that could emerge across the platform related to state elections, as the social media giant outlined its firm resolve to curb hate speech, harmful content and misinformation on its platforms.

    Meta, in a blog, said it has been preparing for these elections in India, and has a comprehensive strategy in place to keep people safe and encourage civic engagement.

    The move assumes significance as big social media platforms have drawn flak in the past over hate speech, misinformation and fake news circulating on their platforms.

    The government had notified IT rules last year to make digital intermediaries more accountable and responsible for content hosted on their platforms.

    IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has recently said social media needs to be made more accountable and stricter rules in this regard could be brought in, if there is political consensus on the matter.

    Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Manipur and Goa will be held between February 10 and March 7 in seven phases, with the counting of votes on March 10.

    In its blogpost on Thursday, Meta underlined its commitment to combating misinformation, harmful content, voter suppression and fake news, while improving transparency of political and social advertising.

    Meta said it is launching the security megaphone before elections to remind users to protect their accounts against online threats by activating two-factor authentication.

    This will be available in three Indian languages, including Hindi.

    “We’ll be activating our Elections Operations Center so we can monitor and respond to potential abuses that we see emerging related to these elections in real time,” Meta said.

    Facebook’s parent company recently changed its name to Meta.

    Apps under Meta include Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram.

    Meta said it has a comprehensive strategy in place for these elections, which includes detecting and removing hate speech and content that incites violence, reducing the spread of misinformation, making political advertising more transparent, and partnering with election authorities to remove content that violates local law.

    Meta acknowledged that is well aware of how hate speech on its platforms can lead to offline harm.

    The backdrop of elections, makes it even more critical for the platform to detect potential hate speech and prevent it from spreading, it pointed out.

    “This is an area that we’ve prioritised and will continue working to address comprehensively for these elections to help keep people safe,” it pledged.

    Meta said it has invested more than USD 13 billion in teams and technology.

    “This has allowed us to triple the size of the global team working on safety and security to over 40,000 including 15,000 plus dedicated content reviewers across 70 languages,” it said.

    For India, Meta has reviewers in 20 Indian languages.

    Under the existing Community Standards, the platform removes certain slurs that it determines to be hate speech.

    “We are also updating our policies regularly to include additional risk areas. To complement that effort, we may deploy technology to identify new words and phrases associated with hate speech, and either remove posts with that language or reduce their distribution,” it said.

    Content that violates policies against hate speech are removed, it said, adding that even where it does not violate policies but can still lead to offline harm if it becomes widespread, the content is demoted so fewer people see it.

    Claiming it has made significant progress on its efforts, Meta said the prevalence of hate speech on the platform is now down to just 0.03 per cent, although “there is always more work to be done”.

    Meta will also be offering Election Day reminders to give voters accurate information and encourage them to share the information with friends on Facebook.

    Last December, it announced the expansion of ads enforcement, requiring ‘Paid By For’ disclaimers for ads about elections or politics, to include social issues.

    “The enforcement will be applicable on ads that discuss, debate, or advocate for or against important topics,” Meta said.

    Ahead of all elections, Meta said it trains political parties about the responsible use of WhatsApp, and party workers are cautioned about the possibility of their accounts getting banned if they send messages to people without prior user-consent.

    “We know that election periods are contentious and they can often be unpredictable. So while we head into these elections in India prepared and ready to meet the challenges we know will be present, we’re also ready to adapt to changing circumstances and unforeseen events,” it said.

    Meta emphasised it will not hesitate to take additional steps if necessary “to protect this important exercise of democracy in India” and keep the platform and the Indian people safe before, during, and after the voting ends.

    India is a large market for social media platforms.

    As per data cited by the government last year, India had 53 crore WhatsApp users, 44.8 crore YouTube users, 41 crore Facebook subscribers, 21 crore Instagram users, while 1.75 crore account holders were on microblogging platform Twitter.

  • Instagram restores page of Indian Army’s Chinar Corps; Facebook in process

    By PTI

    SRINAGAR: After blocking for over a week, social media giant Instagram restored the handle of Chinar Corps, the Indian Army’s strategically located formation in the Kashmir valley, while Facebook has assured a timely solution, officials said here on Wednesday.

    After the issue of Instagram and Facebook taking off the pages was highlighted, the social media website got in touch with the officials at the Kashmir-based XV Corps, popularly known as Chinar Corps, following which the Instagram page, having around four lakh followers, was restored this morning.

    The company had objected to some of the posts, alleging that they were against the rules laid down.

    After e-mail interactions with the technical team of Facebook, the Instagram account was restored while the account on Facebook would be restored soon after all the material from the previous handle was shifted to a new handle, the officials said.

    On Tuesday, a senior official, speaking on condition of anonymity, had said that the matter had been taken up with authorities concerned in Facebook, but there had been no response from their side.

    The pages on Facebook and Instagram were created to negate the lies and propaganda flowing from across the border and also to apprise people of the real situation in the Kashmir valley, the official said.

    There was no official reaction from Facebook.

  • Parliamentary panel on IT wants to call Facebook whistle-blowers to depose before it

    By PTI

    NEW DELHI: Some members of a parliamentary panel looking into the issue of hate speech on Facebook on Monday expressed the view that whistle-blowers Sophie Zhang and Frances Haugen, who have flagged bias and lack of proper regulation on the social media platform, be called to depose before it, sources said.

    Top officials of Facebook India, including its Public Policy Director Shivnath Thukral, on Monday deposed before the panel on the subject of “safeguarding citizens’ rights and prevention of misuse of social/online news media platforms including special emphasis on women security”.

    In the meeting, some members of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology asked them questions about hate speech in reference to the dossiers shared by Zhang with the committee, sources said, adding that the parliamentarians did not get convincing response from the executives of the social media giant.

    The members asked specific questions about the kind of mechanism and system the company has in place to identify and remove hate speech content from its various platforms, they said.

    During the meeting, many members took the view that both whistle-blowers be called before the panel to brief it about their findings, they said.

    The panel is exploring the possibility of calling the whistle-blowers and is likely to seek the Lok Sabha Speaker’s permission, they said.

    Haugen, a former Facebook data scientist-turned-whistle-blower, has alleged that the social network giant’s products harm children and fuel polarisation in the United States.

    She had testified before the US Senate Committee. Zhang, also a former Facebook data scientist, has reportedly shared a dossier with the panel about the company’s alleged unethical working.

    She also reportedly had alleged that there was a ‘politically sophisticated’ attempt to influence the February 2020 Delhi elections.

    Responding to the charge that neither Parliament nor the government has called the Facebook whistle-blowers, panel chairman Shashi Tharoor had said in a series of tweets last month that the committee would hold its first meeting after its constitution in November.

    As video-conferencing not permitted under the procedures, testimony in person by witnesses from abroad requires the Speaker’s consent and it is being sought, he had said.

  • Sextortion gangs are back with Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp video calls showing porn clips

    By IANS

    NEW DELHI: A 35-year-old professor from the University of Delhi recently received a video call on Facebook Messenger from an anonymous number. To his horror, a nude girl appeared on the other side. Before he could disconnect the call, cyber criminals made a quick video of the professor watching the porn clip, and the harassment began.

    “It was around 2 a.m. when I received a call from an unknown person on Facebook Messenger. When I received the call, I saw a nude girl on the other end. I disconnected the call immediately. However, before I could figure out what exactly happened, I received a few screenshots of my video call on Messenger,” a shaken professor told IANS on the condition of anonymity.

    Starting to panic, he immediately blocked the user. After an hour, the professor got an audio call where another man asked him to pay Rs 20,000 via a digital payment app within five minutes, else he would post these screenshots on Facebook for his friends and family community to see.

    “I was nervous and deactivated my Facebook account. Nothing happened after that night to date but I’m still worried,” he said.

    Such anonymous video calls on WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger are growing in India and the relevant authorities are unable to stop such activities.

    According to cyber experts, in a reminiscence of Jamtara-type mobile frauds, the notorious gangs of Mewat region have resurfaced, extorting money from people by blackmailing them with such WhatsApp video callings.

    The gangs operate in the Mewat region of Haryana. Further, Bhiwadi, Tijara, Kishangarh Bas, Ramgarh, Laxmangarh in Alwar and Nagar, Pahadi and Govindgarh in Bharatpur also are the main areas where these cyber thugs are operating from.

    In October, the Crime Branch of Delhi Police claimed to have arrested the mastermind of an interstate sextortion gang from Rajasthan’s Bharatpur.

    According to police, the gang led by Nasir (25) has been indulging in extorting money from reputed persons after blackmailing them with their obscene pictures and videos.

    At least 36 gangs have been busted and 600 accused arrested by Alwar police in the ‘sextortion’ case.

    In the pandemic, there has been a surge in such activities. Cyber criminals run recorded porn videos, and then send your recording back to you, asking for money which could be anywhere from Rs 10,000 to over a few lakh.

    “If denied, they threaten to share your porn-watching video in your social media circles and the mental harassment begins afterwards,” independent cyber security researcher Rajshekhar Rajaharia told IANS.

    A Delhi-NCR based journalist faced the same situation this month when he received a WhatsApp video call and saw a nude girl.

    Surprised as well as confused, he immediately disconnected the call. He later received some screenshots as well a video recorded from the person who called him.

    “The person told me that he is going to send these videos to everyone on social media and asked me to pay Rs 23,000 immediately to delete the video. I blocked him but then, I started getting calls from unknown numbers asking me to transfer the money. I blocked them and turned off my phone for a few hours,” the journalist told IANS.

    He later did not receive any more calls.

    According to Rajaharia, if you do not give in to their demands immediately, there are chances that they won’t share your porn video with others, as doing this will invite trouble for them if the person goes to cyber police with their contact details.

    “However, the victims must quickly contact the cyber branch of police in their respective areas. When you receive an anonymous call, do not pick it immediately. Try to find out the identity of that anonymous person via SMS or WhatsApp chat first, and then check if that person belongs to your known circle of acquaintances or not,” the cyber expert advised.

    “Even if you have taken the anonymous WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger video call, switch off or cover your camera,” he added.

  • IT Min seeks details of algorithm, processes used by FB amid hate speech allegations: Sources

    By PTI

    NEW DELHI: The government has written to Facebook seeking details of the algorithms and processes used by the social media giant, following allegations that the platform failed to check the spread of fake news and hate speech, sources said.

    The move assumes significance as a series of reports recently citing internal documents showed “a struggle with misinformation, hate speech and celebrations of violence” in India – Facebook’s biggest market with over 40 crore users.

    Researchers at the social media giant had pointed out that there are groups and pages replete with inflammatory and misleading content on its platform, as per US media reports.

    According to sources privy to the development, the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) has written to Facebook asking for information around the algorithms and processes used by the platform.

    The government has also asked Facebook to provide details of steps taken to safeguard users, they added.

    When contacted, Facebook declined to comment.

    As per data cited by the Indian government earlier this year, there are 53 crore WhatsApp users, 41 crore Facebook subscribers and 21 crore Instagram account holders.

    It is pertinent to mention here that India enforced new IT intermediary rules earlier this year, aiming to bring greater accountability for big tech companies, including Twitter and Facebook.