A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and U U Lalit also asked them to explain the action taken by them in such instances during the period January 1, 2016, to August 31, 2017. DH file photo
The Supreme Court on Monday sought to know from internet majors - Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Facebook and WhatsApp - the number of complaints they have received over the uploading of objectionable contents like child pornography, rape and gang-rape.
A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and U U Lalit also asked them to explain the action taken by them in such instances during the period January 1, 2016, to August 31, 2017.
The court directed the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) to apprise it about the number of prosecution under the provisions of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO), 2012, during this period.
The court was hearing a letter sent to the then Chief Justice of India H L Dattu by Hyderabad-based NGO Prajwala, along with two rape videos in a pen drive.
The top court had on its own taken cognisance of the letter about the posting of these videos on WhatsApp and asked the CBI to launch a robe to apprehend the
culprits.
During the hearing, the bench was informed by the committee, comprising representatives from the Centre and the internet majors which was constituted to explore technical solutions to block videos of sexual offences on social sites, that these companies had some objection to its report being placed in the public domain.
The chairperson of the committee told the court that these participating companies have raised some objections.
The court asked for supplying the copy of the report to the lawyers representing the internet firms and posted the matter for hearing on September 18.