In the last 48 hours, social media was abuzz with talks about adult websites. Users from Reddit, Twitter and other leading social media platforms had been complaining that they are not able to open their favorite adult websites.
Now, it has been confirmed that 800+ adult websites will be banned in India, and no telecom operator or ISP will be able to allow their access.
At the time of writing, only Reliance Jio had implemented this order, and has already banned all adult websites. Some users are talking about shifting to Airtel and Vodafone to access such adult content, but soon, they would too ban these websites.
Why Adult Websites Are Being Banned?
Last month, Uttrakhand High Court had ordered Govt. to make sure that 857 websites with adult content are banned. The Bench had ordered: “Unlimited access to these adult sites is required to be blocked/curbed to avoid an adverse influence on the impressionable minds of children.”
In their ruling, the Bench had said that if any ISP failed to ban adult content, then their license will be snatched, and they would be asked to stop their services.
As per Section 25 of the Information Technology Act 2000, the license of ISPs can be terminated.
Govt. Is Implementing That Order Now
Since that order was passed, Ministry of Electronics and IT (Meity) had been looking into this issue, and they found that out of 857 adult websites mentioned, 30 portals didn’t had any objectionable content.
Hence, these websites have been ‘spared’, and the rest 827 websites have been blocked. Ministry of Electronics and IT (Meity) has issued the directives to the Department of Telecom to execute this order.
In an order issued to Department of Telecom, MeiTY said, “… all the internet service licensees are instructed to take immediate necessary action for blocking of 827 websites as per the direction from Meity and for the compliance of the Hon’ble High Court order,”
In China too, adult websites have been completely banned. Last month, 4000 websites with adult content were banned, all across China. In total, more than 22,000 websites have faced a ban in China, over this issue.
As per a recent report by University of Toronto-based Citizen Lab along with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, India is among the top 10 nations to block content on the Internet.
In 2013 too, such a ban was announced, and partially implemented as well, but soon, adult websites were once again accessible.
We will keep you updated, as we receive more details.