India tells X to block over 8,000 accounts
By Anuj Chopra
Washington: India has ordered
X
to block more than 8,000 accounts, the platform said Thursday, adding that it was reluctantly complying with what it described as government-imposed "censorship."
The move appears to be part of India's sweeping crackdown targeting social media accounts of Pakistani politicians, celebrities and media organizations amid heightened tensions and deadly confrontations between the nuclear-armed neighbors.
The order, which X said includes demands to block
international
news organizations and other prominent users, comes a day after Meta banned a prominent Muslim news page on Instagram in India at New Delhi's request.
"X has received executive orders from the Indian government requiring X to block over 8,000 accounts in India, subject to potential penalties including significant fines and imprisonment of the company's local employees," the site's global government affairs team said in a statement.
It added that in most cases, the government had not specified which posts from the accounts violated Indian laws, and in many others, it provided no evidence or justification for the blocks.
The Elon Musk-owned platform said it disagreed with the demands but it had begun the process to withhold the specified accounts in India.
"Blocking entire accounts is not only unnecessary, it amounts to censorship of existing and future content, and is contrary to the fundamental right of free speech," the statement said.
"This is not an easy decision, however keeping the platform accessible in India is vital to Indians' ability to access information."
X said it could not make the Indian executive orders public due to legal restrictions, but it encouraged the impacted users to seek "appropriate relief from the courts."
The move comes amid fierce exchanges of artillery between India and Pakistan that has killed more than 50 people, two weeks after New Delhi blamed Islamabad for backing a deadly attack on tourists in the Indian-run side of the disputed Muslim-majority region of Kashmir.
Pakistan rejects the charge.
Pakistan accounts hacked
Pakistan's National Cyber Emergency Response Team (NCERT) meanwhile warned of the risk of increased cyberattacks on emails, social media, QR codes and messaging apps.
Both Pakistan's Ministry of Economic Affairs and the Karachi Port Trust said this week that their X accounts had been hacked and later restored.
In the case of the Karachi Port Trust, the account was hacked to say that the port -- one of South Asia's busiest -- has been attacked by the Indian military.
The X account was later restored and the port authority said that no attack had taken place.
India has also banned more than a dozen Pakistani YouTube channels for allegedly spreading "provocative" content, including Pakistani news outlets.
Pakistani Bollywood movie regulars Fawad Khan and Atif Aslam were also off limits in India, as well as a wide range of cricketers including Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan.
Rising hostilities between the South Asian neighbors have unleashed an avalanche of online misinformation, with social media users circulating everything from deepfake videos to outdated images from unrelated conflicts, falsely linking them to the ongoing fighting.
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