Page 2 of 2 Foreign Web firms face
India
clampdown By Indrajit Basu
recommend measures for having URL
(universal resource locator)-based blocking with
ISPs.
Moreover, according to Rajesh
Chharia, president of the Internet Service
Providers Association of India, the DOT recently
told the three telecom companies that own Internet
landing stations (cable landing points where a
submarine or other underwater cable makes
landfall) to put in place an advance screening
system at
bandwidth landing stations.
"The DOT has already intimated this
decision to us," said Chharia, "and after the
system is in place the DOT can direct the
landing-station operators not only to block a
particular URL at the sub-domain level but also
VoIP telephony services such as Yahoo, MSN and
Skype (and many more) because, strictly speaking,
these have not obtained the required permission to
operate VoIP services in India."
India's
censorship of the Internet became a hot issue last
July when, after terrorist blasts in Mumbai, the
DOT ordered ISPs to ban 18 blogs and websites.
However, as India ISPs did not possess the
technology needed to execute the directive, they
implemented the ban at the domain level. This
resulted in a public outcry and international
criticism, as users were unable to access scores
of websites and blogs.
However, while
India says censoring the Internet is not its
intention - "We just want to regulate the
Internet," says the TRAI - international agencies
such as Reporters Without Borders allege that the
country's increasing control over it has already
started to encroach on the rights of users. A few
even say India could soon join the list of the two
dozen-odd countries that have recently been
identified as the most censorship-happy in the
world. These countries include China, Iran, Saudi
Arabia, Myanmar, Pakistan and Uzbekistan (see Asia's battle against the
Web, Asia Times Online, May 16).
Nevertheless, the moot question is, can
India really censor the Internet legally? That is
a gray area. Although under the constitution there
is no established law defining Internet
censorship, under the Information Technology Act
2000, CERT-IN was created along the lines of
similar authorities around the world to monitor
all incoming and outgoing Internet traffic from
India. Its main mission, it says, "is to enhance
the security of India's communications and
information infrastructure through proactive
action and effective collaboration".
The
primary purpose of CERT-IN is to handle Internet
security so that "websites promoting hate content,
slander or defamation of others, promoting
gambling, promoting racism, violence and terrorism
and other such material, in addition to promoting
pornography, including child pornography and
violent sex, can easily be blocked, since all such
websites may not claim a constitutional right of
free speech".
But the TRAI's latest
proposals fall outside the scope of CERT-IN and
hamper the proper functioning of the Internet,
says a director-level official at Microsoft India,
who requested anonymity. "The fact is that the
Internet is a global network and its beauty and
efficiency lie in the fact that one can access any
server on the Internet irrespective of the
location of the place of access and destination,"
he said.
Representatives of foreign
companies such as Skype and Yahoo also argue that
it is impossible to exercise control over users of
their services. Since these services are
Web-based, a service provider is rarely aware of
the location of subscribers. Moreover, subscribers
of their services in India access Web servers
hosted in their country - that is, the US - where
services such as Internet telephony are allowed.
For that matter, Skype even says that since laws
regarding such services as Web-hosting and
Internet telephony vary from country to country,
it's the user who should not use such services if
they are forbidden by law in their country.
Meanwhile, it seems that the TRAI
recommendations on Internet services have ruffled
the feathers of local Internet companies as well.
The TRAI has suggested the imposition of higher
license fees and a new revenue-sharing regime, and
has said that services such as Internet TV and the
IPVPN (Internet protocol virtual private network)
are out of the scope of the ISP license.
"The TRAI recommendations on Internet
services are shocking to say the least and are
against the interests of the Internet industry and
the consumer," said Chharia. "They could defeat
the whole purpose of high growth and removal of
the digital divide."
Indrajit
Basu is a Kolkata-based journalist.
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