--- publish: true author: Prateek Waghre date: 2022-01-24 section: "03-" --- ## Content So, in [57: In The FIR-ing line](https://techpolicy.substack.com/p/of-manufacturing-consensus-worldwide), I wrote about some themes I observed in my effort to track police cases/FIRs/threats/arrests related to posts on social media. I’m not sure I want to make this a weekly recurring section at this point, so we’ll just see where this goes. Here’s an external link to the tracker: [Tracking Arrests / Cases / FIRs / Threat(s) / Detentions related to posts on Social Media (notion.site)](https://prateekwaghre.notion.site/Tracking-Arrests-Cases-FIRs-Threat-s-Detentions-related-to-posts-on-Social-Media-fbd46a35aad6490a8b2b57966b9020bb) I also made some changes to the organisation + added a few new views. [Prateek Waghre @prateekwaghre Updated with ~15 new events/reports today. + Views for "Common Events" (those with multiple updates)](https://twitter.com/prateekwaghre/status/1483768146733707264) [prateekwaghre.notion.site/Tracking-Arres…](https://prateekwaghre.notion.site/Tracking-Arrests-Cases-FIRs-Threat-s-Detentions-related-to-posts-on-Social-Media-fbd46a35aad6490a8b2b57966b9020bb) (sample screenshots included)    [ January 19th 2022 ](https://twitter.com/prateekwaghre/status/1483768146733707264) I’ve included some notable instances here. I am summarising so it is entirely possible I may flatten some context in my effort to try and group them, therefore I do recommend heading over to the tracker and the articles for better context. - Interesting story about Andhra Pradesh, where law enforcement authorities want to set up (expand?) social media labs in each district. And claim to be monitoring over 1000 instances of cyber-bullying [[The New Indian Express](https://www.newindianexpress.com/states/andhra-pradesh/2022/jan/18/every-district-to-get-cyber-cell-social-media-lab-2408096.html)]. > Director General of Police (DGP) Gautam Sawang has said state-of-the-art cyber cells and social media labs will soon be set up in every district to curb, control cyber crimes and educate people on it, and tackle financial crimes through social media platforms. > > The DGP informed that cyber-bullying sheets were opened against 1,551 persons who were accused in various cases and they were being monitored. It is worth considering how much surveillance we want on social media spaces. Yes, there are a lot of harms, but as the tracker itself shows, application of the law, so far, appears to be rather inconsistent. **Aside**: There’s always humour/sarcasm/memes to express dissent [[Shephali Bhatt - Livemint](https://lifestyle.livemint.com/news/big-story/in-lol-memes-gen-z-has-found-a-language-of-dissent-111641731353470.html)] > A Twitter user with an enviable following said they resorted to these “play-along” memes after they were arrested by the cyber police recently and interrogated for 24 hours for sly-tweeting about the response to the pandemic. > > In such a political climate, the play-along memes represent perhaps “the only language of dissent that’s left on the internet,” says Akash Banerjee, a political satirist and YouTuber whose channel, The DeshBhakt, has over 2.3 million subscribers. “We’re living in a time when even hard facts are seen as an extremist point of view because they don’t go down well with a certain dispensation,” he adds. **Aside within the Aside**: The role of humour is also complex, as I wrote in [21: Of Humour, Framing, Tin-foil pyramids and Bot-ching Democracy](https://techpolicy.substack.com/p/of-humour-framing-tin-foil-pyramids) and [22: Of Q-A-Gone, Laughter, Models and Roles](https://techpolicy.substack.com/p/of-q-a-gone-laughter-models-and-roles), and hope to revisit in a future edition. - Careful what you say about: - Chief Ministers, specifically, and politicians, in general - There were cases against posts about CMs of UP [[ThePrint](https://theprint.in/india/teenager-detained-for-objectionable-post-against-cm/805948/)], Telangana [[Deccan Chronicle](https://www.deccanchronicle.com/nation/crime/180122/threat-via-twitter-tirupati-police-book-case-on-unknown-for-thr.html)], and Asadudin Owaisi [[Telagana Today](https://telanganatoday.com/two-booked-for-morphing-image-of-asaduddin-owaisi)]. Raghav Chadha filed a lawsuit against a ‘Patiala resident’ (that’s what the headline said) [[The Indian Express](https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/delhi/aaps-raghav-chadha-sues-patiala-resident-over-defamatory-social-media-remarks-7735241/)] - Law enforcement agencies - For “adverse comments” and sharing official records [[Telangana Today](https://telanganatoday.com/case-booked-against-bjp-corporator)] - The age-old question (of the last 5-6 years) - are platforms platforms or are platforms publishers? A judge from the Madras HC asks why platforms can’t be included in criminal cases… and asked for a report on how to prevent misuse of YouTube, _in a week(!)._ I guess I can retire. > The judge, while asking Duraimurugan's counsel, orally observed that several people are misusing the platform to earn money and some have even admitted that they learned to commit offences like making guns, robbing through videos on Youtube. He also questioned why the social media platforms like YouTube cannot be added as an accused in such cases. > > The judge also directed the Tamil Nadu ADGP - Cyber Crime branch to submit a detailed report on the mechanism needs to be adopted to prevent misuse of YouTube in a week.” - Plus, updates in the Clubhouse, BulliBai and Dharam Sansad cases. The tracker now has a view for these multi-story events [[link](https://www.notion.so/prateekwaghre/6a32471566ca4ab2947880be1426a340?v=8177404f479b4a56a6838620b64ae74e)], each containing a filtered version of the main table. ## Related Notes * [[FIR-ing Line Series]] ## Colophon %% title:: FIR-ing Line 2 type:: [[output]] tags:: url:: file:: creator:: Prateek Waghre %% created:: 2022-01-24 status:: [[brewing]]