Revision as of 21:13, 7 March 2021

Government requests

2012-17: Content removal

Kim Arora, Rise in India's requests to Twitter to drop content, September 22, 2017: The Times of India

India has shown a steady increase in the number of account information and content removal requests sent to Twitter from the government since 2012, with the maximum number of requests made between January and June 2017.

India made 104 requests for content removal and another 261 requests for account information. It was the sixth largest number of requests for account information after the US, Japan, the UK, Turkey and France. Twitter released these numbers in its half-yearly transparency report.

Twitter fulfilled 21% of the 261 account information requ ests India made. These requests covered 659 accounts. This number was up from 168 requests made in July-December 2016, where 427 accounts were specified. Although the number of requests has been lower in previous years, the number of accounts has been significantly higher before.

“These fluctuations and rise in numbers is tough to ascribe to any one factor. It could be because of more people using the service, or because of the government starting to recognise Twitter and social media as places where a law and order problem can occur, or it could be censorship,“ says Parminder Jeet Singh, executive director for Bengaluru-based NGO IT for Change.

2015-18: requests for user data

Digbijay Mishra, Govt requests for info from Twitter surge, December 15, 2018: The Times of India

Requests made by the Government of India to Twitter for user data, 2015-18
From: Digbijay Mishra, Govt requests for info from Twitter surge, December 15, 2018: The Times of India

The Indian government wants to know more about what you do on Twitter and its curiosity is only growing. The Centre’s requests from Twitter for user data has risen by over 100% in the last two years, as per the latest transparency report released by the social media major. Between January and June 2018, India sought information on 355 accounts, up from 261 and 139 in the first six months of 2017 and 2016 respectively. Twitter’s transparency data shows that the numbers every six months have been rising.

However, Twitter provided information in the case of only 11% of the requests made by the government in the first six months of 2018. It got 246 requests for removal of accounts in this period and obliged to only about 5% of them. Twitter’s rate of acceptance of government requests has fallen sharply, from 31% in the first half of 2016, to 11% in the latest period. Indian authorities (government, police, court orders) sought to remove 144 accounts in the second half of 2017, and 104 in the first half of that year.

The data showed Twitter withheld (prevented access to) two accounts and 23 tweets in response to a legal demand from the IT ministry for propagating objectionable content. Following legal requests, a total of 19 accounts and 498 tweets were withheld.

The past few years have seen increasingly harsh, often incendiary, posts on social media. More Indians have also flocked to Twitter to air their views. The rising requests from the government is partly a reflection of its attempt to control the more inflammatory posts. When demands are made legally, based on the laws of the land, social media companies are obliged to respect the demand. In other cases, they need to take into account whether accepting the government request would amount to violating the freedom of expression of the user.

In India, between 2012 and 2014, the government sent less than 100 requests for information. But in the first six months of 2015 alone, over 100 requests were made.

India is said to have about 30 million Twitter users, as per estimates by market research firm Statista.

Globally too, government requests have been rising. Twitter said that in the first half of the year, it received 10% more government information requests worldwide, compared to the preceding six-month period — the largest percentage increase since 2015. There was also an 80% rise in global legal demands for removal of accounts in the first six months, compared to the preceding sixmonth period. Close to 90% of these requests came from Russia and Turkey.

2021: Twitter blocks 97% handles on govt list

Pankaj Doval, February 12, 2021: The Times of India

In Feb 2021: Twitter blocked 97% handles on the govt list
From: Pankaj Doval, February 12, 2021: The Times of India

There were signs of a thaw in Twitter’s tussle with the government after the social media giant took down over 97% of the handles that the IT ministry had sought to be censured for carrying “inflammatory content” related to ‘farmers’ genocide’ hashtag and accounts backed by Khalistan sympathisers and Pakistan.

Of the 1,435 handles flagged by the government through two separate requests, 1,398 have been taken down, top sources said.

The breakthrough in the deadlock came after IT secretary Ajay Prakash Sawhney’s meeting with Twitter executives Monique Meche and Jim Baker late Wednesday evening, following which the American social media giant started to act against the users.

“The compliance has come in for almost the entire list of accounts that we had asked to be taken down. For the remaining, Twitter has said that it is following the due process, which includes sending notice to the users and other such steps,” a government source told TOI.

‘A positive step by Twitter’

All the 1,178 handles that the government had flagged for possible links with Khalistani and Pakistani elements have been blocked.

Of the 257 handles that were sought to be blocked over the controversial hashtag, 220 have been taken down. “Some of the accounts could be duplicates,” the source said. However, some accounts such as that of CPM leader Mohammed Salim (@salimdotcomrade) and Caravan magazine (@thecaravanindia) remain functional. “We view this as a positive step that Twitter has taken. It does follow from the meaningful and healthy conversations that we had with the global executives of the company,” the government source said.

A spokesperson for Twitter in India did not respond to a questionnaire from TOI.

While the social media platform had earlier refused to comply with the government’s requests, on Wednesday, the IT secretary expressed displeasure over “differential treatment”.

“They must be obeyed immediately. If they are executed days later, it becomes meaningless,” IT Sawhney said. He also made it clear that the use of the controversial hashtag was neither journalistic freedom nor freedom of expression as such “irresponsible content could provoke and inflame” the situation.

Sources said that during the meeting, Baker, Twitter’s VP for legal matters, assured government representatives that the company would be mindful of the concerns. “Baker said that the global management of Twitter can be approached directly in case of violations that are sensitive in nature. This is seen as a massive reassurance to tackle hate, inflammatory and irresponsible messaging,” the source said.

The misuse of Twitter

2014

2014: The misuse of Twitter in India and the world, and action taken

See graphic :

2014:The misuse of Twitter in India and the world, and action taken

The usage of Twitter

2016: The emoji tweeted most often

India and the world, the emoji tweeted most often, 2016
The Times of India

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The emoji tweeted most often, India and the world, 2016

2019: politicians, their parties and their gender

Mohammad Ibrar, Get a handle on this: Women calling poll shots on Twitter, March 21, 2019: The Times of India

Handles of women with maximum number of followers, 2019.
From: Mohammad Ibrar, Get a handle on this: Women calling poll shots on Twitter, March 21, 2019: The Times of India

It is politically prudent perhaps to give women their place in politics. After all, as research with Twitter data shows, handles of women on the platform have more followers on average than men and these handles also generate more content than men do. And even if the handles of women produce less original content, their retweets and engagement are high on Twitter, making them an asset for political parties especially in the coming general elections.

Admittedly, of the 1,252 verified political handles analysed, only 133 belonged to female political activists, the rest being those of male politicians or party handles. Analysed and studied at Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) Delhi and International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad, by a team of eight students as part of the focus on the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, these were culled after going through “over 21 million posts by roughly a million handles collected from the 2014 general elections”.

Ponnurangam Kumaraguru, associate professor at both IIITs, said he and his team of researchers covered data of over 2,585 Twitter handles which showed some sort of affiliation to an Indian political party. “This list was manually curated and we have been collecting data for these handles from late 2018 through the Twitter Application Programming Interface (API).”

On March 12, Trinamool Congress announced a list of candidates for West Bengal that had over 40% women. Similarly, Biju Janata Dal has said 33% of its candidates in Odisha will be women. A push of this nature is reflective of the increasing female participation on social media. On Twitter, for instance, the study showed that on average, women’s handles had 36,85,000 followers, with the minimum at 422 and the maximum of 12.2 million for external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj.

On average, the feminine handles generated 9,834 tweets each. Compare that with the 7,432 by their male counterparts. This is despite handles belong to men numbering 865, or 69.1%, of the 1,252 verified political handles. A majority of the female tweeters showed their origin to be in Maharashtra, Delhi and UP, the hotbed of political activism.

Social media will be a distinct factor in this election, felt Kumaraguru, and women politicians appeared to have a lot of clout on social media. “Gender diversity is a universal topic, and we find interesting patterns like female handles re-tweeting more,” said Kumaraguru. “Tweets by females on average get retweeted more than those by men — 550 times compared with 530 times for tweets by males.”

2021: What Indian women tweeted about

Shobita Dhar, Passions & pursuits: What Indian women tweet about, March 7, 2021: The Times of India

What do Indian women talk about on twitter? “Passions and pursuits” is the most discussed topic of conversation, with 25% of all women users coming on to Twitter to seek and consume this content. Out of this 25%, the majority (30%) seek content on fashion, 28% on books, 25% on beauty, 21% on movies and TV and 14% on sports. Over 40% of women said they discovered a new interest on Twitter.

‘Current affairs’ is the second most searched and consumed content, with 21% of all women users using Twitter to know what’s going on around them. Women from Delhi and Guwahati led this segment. About 21% use Twitter to stay informed on local and international news. Tweets about #StudentExams, #COVID19 related updates and #DelhiElections2020 dominated the conversation in this category.

These are findings from a research commissioned by Twitter India ahead of International Women’s Day. For the report, a qualitative curation and analysis of 5,22,992 tweets sent from Twitter accounts of women between January 2019 and February 2021 in 10 Indian cities was done. The majority of women, 33%, use Twitter while commuting; 29% catch up on the latest tweets during breakfast and 22% don’t go to bed without looking it up. Although Twitter doesn’t have data on how many women users it has in India, their research found that almost 9% use it to create and participate in social movements like #MeToo and #TimesUp.

While Twitter can often be a toxic place for women with many journalists, celebrities and politicians often receiving abuse and even rape threats on it, this doesn’t deter women from using the platform. About 40% said it provides them with freedom of expression.

About 12% used the platform to connect and network with others in their communities, like #WomenInScience and #GirlGamers. Women from Chennai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad were especially found to be active in this category. Nearly 7% women used Twitter to share and talk about everyday hardships like #Parenting, #WorkingFromHome.

“We commissioned this research to build our understanding about women on Twitter. Access to a free and open internet has made it possible for everyone to express themselves freely without barriers,” said Manish Maheshwari, managing director, Twitter India. While 41% of women have sought advice/tips/recommendations on the service, 37% have given advice/tips/recommendations.

The most followed Indians

As in 2020

The Indians most followed on Twitter, presumably as in 2020 Feb
From: March 3, 2020: The Times of India

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The Indians most followed on Twitter, presumably as in 2020 Feb