India Tightens IT Rules for Social Media Content Removal

The Indian government has significantly reduced the deadlines for social media platforms to remove sensitive and unlawful online content. Under amendments to the Information Technology (IT) Rules, 2021, introduced on February 10, 2026, the timeline for removing unlawful content following a valid government or court direction has been shortened from 36 hours to three hours. For highly sensitive issues such as nudity or impersonation, the deadline has been reduced from 24 hours to two hours.

These changes specifically target harms from synthetically generated information (SGI), including deepfakes and AI-generated content. The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) now requires intermediaries to ensure clear labelling and traceable metadata for AI-generated content to prevent deception. Significant Social Media Intermediaries (SSMIs) with more than 50 lakh users must deploy technical measures, such as automated tools, to proactively detect content depicting rape or child sexual abuse.

Additional changes include a shortened grievance redressal timeline, which now requires platforms to resolve complaints within 36 hours instead of 72. The government warned that intermediaries failing to comply with these obligations will lose their third party content exemption under Section 79 of the Information Technology Act, potentially making them liable for legal prosecution.

While both reports focus on the regulatory changes, they differ slightly in emphasis. The center leaning coverage highlights the specific reduction of timelines across multiple categories and the legal consequences for platforms. The center right leaning coverage emphasizes the government's goal of strengthening user accountability and the specific requirements for AI metadata to prevent misuse.