From Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi: After imposing a ban on bulk SMSes/MMSes for a couple of days all over the country, the Union Government had also toyed with the idea of blocking micro-blogging site Twitter in eight states as the content on it was thought to be one of the main reasons for triggering the recent mass exodus of Northeastern people from Bangalore, Pune and Mumbai.
The Department of Electronics and IT (DEIT) wanted to block Twitter and asked experts how and whether it could be done, sources said here on Sunday. The states identified for banning Twitter included Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Assam.
The DEIT plan followed an advice by the Union Home Ministry which felt that content and photographs on Twitter contributed to the panic and exodus, the sources said.
However, differences arose between MHA and the PMO on this sensitive issue, with both National Security Adviser MK Narayanan and Principal Secretary to the PM, Pulok Chatterjee, discouraging the move, the sources said.
The Government had, earlier, ordered blocking of 310 web pages where morphed and inflammatory contents were uploaded with the aim to incite communal passions and create panic among people of the North East living in states like Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra.
Addressing the DGPs/IGPs conference here on Saturday, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh had talked about misuse of the Internet and said the government was working on a robust cyber security structure which would address threat management and mitigation, assurance and certification, specially building capacity and enhancing research.
At the same time, he said it needed to be ensured that any plans to counter the propaganda on Internet did not infringe upon the rights of freedom of expression of the people.
The Prime Minister also highlighted the country’s escalating vulnerability to cyber crime ‘as our economy and critical infrastructure become increasingly reliant on interdependent computer networks and the Internet’.