DoT armed to shut down porn sites
In the last 10 months, 89 sites were taken off from the web.
Hyderabad: As the internet is flooded with pornographic websites, multiple agencies like department of telecommunication (DoT), ministry of IT and police are acting seriously to down shutters on them.
Following a complaint by the Tollywood industry, the Telangana police is identifying the websites with pornographic contents, morphed pictures of film stars and criticism against prominent film personalities and politicians.
An official from the DoT said that the department had only one deputy director-general (vigilance) post three years ago to monitor internet-related violations. “Now, the department has strengthened it with more DDGs, directors, assistant director-generals and supporting staff.
The DoT has also started a security wing which monitors security-related threats to the nation,” the official said.
About the formalities to shut down a website, V. Rammohan, SP of CID, said, “We need a complaint followed by an FIR for filing the chargesheet. Based on the court direction, we write letters to the DoT for shutting down a website,” he said.
Sources from the Telangana police said that in the last 10 months, nearly 89 websites have been shut down by various wings.
K.C.S. Raghu Veer, assistant commissioner of police of Hyderabad cyber wing, said that the cyber crime unit recently shut down two pornographic websites.
Need to enforce strict laws
Officials from agencies investigating pornographic and particularly child pornographic sites say they have issued notices to internet service providers, but this is a temporary solution and does not tackle the problem effectively.
A source at the Department of Telecom (DoT) said that besides DoT, the intelligence network of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting is also monitoring such websites. “Shutting down a website is nothing; it must be completely removed from the internet. As the hosting servers are from other countries, we direct our Internet Service Providers to block particular websites. The site will not appear on the web under the jurisdiction of the concerned ISPs, but it will live at other locations. As ISPs are under DoT, we act strictly when rules are violated by suspending their licences.”
The source added that Parliament should make a law that enables control of such sites permanently. He said that apart from DoT, the government has also organised a meeting with ISPs to urge them to remove pornographic, especially child pornographic websites.