Twitter had on June 25 temporarily blocked the then IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad‘s official handle. Since then there was tussle was going on with the central government.
Twitter said on Thursday that it had informed former IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad before blocking his account last month under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act(DMCA) and later restored the account.
“When we remove or disable access to the materials reported in a copyright complaint, the reported user(s) will receive a copy of the complaint, including the reporter’s full name, email, street address, and any other information included in the complaint. The user will also get the detailed information regarding filing a counter-notice,” sources in the panel told ANI.
The micro-blogging site was responding to the Shashi Tharoor-led Parliamentary panel for Information Technology. Twitter temporarily suspended Prasad’s account citing copyright violations, only to apologise and restore it later.
Twitter in its reply said, “As per our copyright policy, Twitter responds to copyright complaints submitted under the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”). Section 512 of the DMCA outlines, In the case of Ravi Shankar Prasad, Minister of Law & Justice, Communications and Electronics and Information Technology as well Dr Shashi Tharoor, Chairperson for the Parliamentary Committee on Information Technology, Twitter received DMCA notices from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) alleging that video Tweets posted on their accounts infringed copyrighted works owned by Sony Music Entertainment.”
The Parliamentary panel further asked Twitter to explain what its SOP (standard operating procedure) was for blocking the accounts and if the protocols were followed.
“Additionally, via the in-app notification received at the time of content removal, the account holder is asked to review and acknowledge that they have understood Twitter’s copyright policy. Further, there may be certain uses of copyrighted material that do not require the copyright owner’s permission, such as political speech, content that is potentially newsworthy, or cases of apparent fair use. This type of speech is protected under UN-recognized principles of free expression and may not violate Twitter’s Copyright Policy,” it added.
