Concerns raised over blocking of Twitter accounts in India
February 03, 2021
These Twitter accounts were reinstated a couple of hours later
Twitter’s shocking decision to temporarily block hundreds of accounts in India at the behest of the government has raised concerns about the power exerted by the government over social media companies and the inability of social media behemoths to take an independent stance. The manner in which the orders were issued by the government is still keeping people in the dark about why this entire episode unravelled in the first place.
Late afternoon on February 1, over 250 accounts and tweets on Twitter - typically associated with the farmers’ protests in India - started getting blocked en masse, in response to what Twitter described as a “properly scoped request from an authorized entity.” While access to these accounts were reinstated a couple of hours later, the damage was done that the social media giant had blocked access to hundre