The Supreme Court has taken a grim view of the alarming increase in the circulation of child sexual exploitation and abuse material (CSEAM) on social media and issued guidelines to the government and its school authorities to tackle the menace at various levels.
A bench of Justice J.B. Pardiwala and Justice K. Vinod Chandran passed the directions after noting that the Supreme Court had issued directions in 2024 for measures to be implemented to deal with the problem, but not much progress had been made.
The court’s latest directions were passed on a PIL by the NGO Just Rights for Children Alliance, bringing to its notice the unabated increase in CSEAM circulating across social media platforms even two years after the earlier order was issued to tackle the crime. The NGO urged the court to direct the Centre and the states to evolve an adequate mechanism to deal with the matter.
The bench passed the following directions to the Centre, states, the NCERT and the SCERTs in the states, reproduced verbatim:
Digital safety and age-appropriate sex education must form a part of the core curriculum. They must be developed by the NCERT and the SCERTs in consultation with child psychologists, educators and parenting experts. It must accommodate the diverse levels of literacy across the country through use of text-based courses, pictorial representations, illustrations and audio-visual content
The Union of India has made considerable efforts in putting in place helplines and portals for supporting victims of such incidents and facilitating commensurate actions against the perpetrators. Self-help mechanisms such as the child helpline 1098, the cyber crime helpline 1930 and the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal, along with the details of state-wise nodal officers, must be displayed in every classroom, hostel, library and computer laboratory, as well as on the website of every school and educational institution
Devices and networks within the premises of educational institutions and schools must be equipped with filters to prevent access to harmful content in a reasonable and proportionate manner. These measures must also extend to hostels, childcare institutions, tuition and coaching centres with greater rigour
Teachers and other school staff must be adequately trained on digital safety measures and age-appropriate positive sex education. The training must cover the signs of grooming, abuse and online harassment; the manner of responding to any disclosure by a child; the obligation to report under Section(s) 19 and 21 of the POCSO Act; and the confidentiality to be maintained in respect of the child. The non-teaching staff of educational institutions must also be adequately sensitised to respond to such situations
The central government shall provide information, by way of an affidavit, on the tools and technological measures that have been put in place by intermediaries for the detection and removal of CSEAM from their platforms
Appropriate guidelines or a standard operating procedure shall be framed by the Centre for the use of perceptual hash matching and URL listing by all significant social media intermediaries for the detection and removal of CSEAM from their platforms
The Union of India shall create a National Hash & URL List Database for the sole purpose of the detection and removal of CSEAM. Such a database may be created as part of the Sahyog Portal or as a standalone repository
The Union of India shall further consider putting in place a framework for imposing exemplary monetary fines on intermediaries for the breach of any duties under the IT Act and the IT Rules
The quantum of such penalties must be determined having regard to the gravity, duration and recurrence of the default as well as the size and turnover of the intermediary.
Where any CSEAM or prohibited material is found to have been hosted, uploaded, promoted or circulated, directly or indirectly, through any paywall or subscription from which the intermediary derives any revenue, the revenue so derived from such content should be forfeited and disgorged
Every intermediary must ensure that no CSEAM, or any other material having the propensity or likelihood to harm children, is offered, hosted, uploaded, promoted or circulated through such paywall or subscription, either directly or indirectly.