In a letter dated January 10, NCPCR head Priyank Kanoongo has asked Chatt to be present physically at the statutory body’s office.
Failure to appear before the commission will lead to YouTube India being penalised or other legal action as appropriate against the platform, it said.
The child rights body has asked Chatt to bring along a comprehensive list of YouTube channels running “challenges” that depict minors in compromising situations with adults, it said in a release on Thursday.
Meanwhile, the cyber cell of Maharashtra police has filed a first information report (FIR) against YouTube India officials and some of the people running channels that hosted alleged child sexual abuse material and other content harmful to children. The FIR was filed on a notice sent by NCPCR.
YouTube India did not respond to an email seeking their response to the letter and the FIR filed against their executives as of press time Thursday.“CSAM and content harmful to children are prohibited for platforms to carry and government as a whole has a zero-tolerance approach to any violation of safety and trust obligations relating to CSAM and other prohibited content under IT rules 3(1)(b),” union minister of state for electronics and information technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar told ET.On October 6 last year, the IT ministry had sent notices to social media platforms X (formerly Twitter), YouTube and Telegram, asking them to remove pornographic CSAM present on their platforms.
The notices were sent a day after ET reached out to senior officials in the ministry on the issue and sought their response to the presence of pornographic and CSAM material on these platforms.
NCPCR is a statutory government body tasked with the protection of child rights and other matters in the country.
The commission, in its statement, said it took suo-moto cognisance of some videos on YouTube and sent notices to state police departments across the country asking them to investigate the matter and book the people running these channels.
While Maharashtra is the first state to take such action, NCPRC said it expects “similar prompt response from the other states as well”.
In a meeting with representatives from social media and internet intermediaries on Thursday Chandrasekhar asked all companies to ensure no presence of any of the content prohibited under IT Rules, especially CSAM.
