India sent maximum account information requests to Twitter during second half of 2020

India accounted for the maximum number of account information requests by the government on the microblogging site Twitter for the period of July-December 2020 (H2), indicated a recently uploaded transparency report on Information Requests from Twitter.  

Twitter had received a total of 3,615 information requests from India during the period from the government, law enforcement and third party. This is a 46% increase over the period of January to June 2020 (H1).  

The number of accounts specified also rose 27% in H2 over H1. Twitter’s rate of compliance with these requests fell from 1% in H1 to 0.6% in H2 indicated the report.  

India was also the second highest country requesting removal of content from Twitter based on legal demands and local laws in H2 2020, according to a report on Removal Requests released by Twitter.  

The top spot was held by Japan, accounting for 43% of the total global requests while India accounted for 18% of global legal demands. 

Twitter received 38, 524 legal demands during the period globally which specified removal of content posted by 1,31, 933 accounts. The data includes requests which fall under Country Withheld Content (CWC) tool. 

“Many countries, including the United States, have laws that may apply to Tweets and/or Twitter account content. In our continuing effort to make our services available to people everywhere, if we receive a valid and properly scoped request from an authorized entity, it may be necessary to withhold access to certain content in a particular country from time to time,” explains Twitter.  

“Such withholdings will be limited to the specific jurisdiction that has issued the valid legal demand or where the content has been found to violate local law(s),” says the platform. 

Globally Twitter received legal demands for removal of content posted by 199 accounts of verified journalists and news outlets on the platform globally during H2, 2020. In total, 361 legal demands were sent to Twitter, including removal requests from India, which led with 128 legal demands, Turkey, Pakistan and Russia.  

Earlier this week Twitter published its first monthly compliance report for India detailing the number of grievances received by the platform during the period of May 26 to June 25.  

The report published by the platform as per the mandate of new IT rules said that the platform had received 56 grievances demanding the suspension of accounts during the period.