Indian Government Blocks Over 800 Porn Websites

A directive had been passed, late Friday evening, blocking around 800 porn websites. Although, the effect of this legislation may not have taken place all over the country, it is said to become active in a couple of days.

So now when one tries to access a particular porn website, an error message will show, suggesting that the Indian government had asked the Internet Service Provider (ISP) to block the site. This is the result of a PIL that is being held in the Supreme Court asking the government to block citizens from accessing pornography  on the internet. In November, the government asked the Internet And Mobile Association of India to curate a list of pornography websites that could be passed on to ISPs.

The list is reported to contain over 800 websites and has been handed over to ISPs by the government under Section 79 of Information Technology Act. The act is in relation to intermediaries and cases where they are involved in its transmission. Chief Justice HL Dattu, had said “Such interim orders cannot be passed by this court. Somebody may come to the court and say look I am above 18 and how can you stop me from watching it within the four walls of my room. It is a violation of Article 21 [right to personal liberty],” while asking the government to come up with a reply within four weeks.

While this move might seem slightly controversial, and dare we say, bordering on interference from the government in personal matters, it is said that one could still access the websites using VPN or proxies. Moreover, the blockade is on the URLs, so the websites could themselves resurface under a different URL.

Let us know what you think about this legislation.

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