Over one lakh harmful posts removed in India-Google

In its latest monthly report, Google has removed over 1 lakh harmful posts during May-June this year in accordance with the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021-- IT Rules.  Google removed 71,132 pieces of content in May and took 83,613 removal actions in June following user complaints, the company said in its monthly transparency reports released on Friday. In addition to reports from users, Google also removed 6,34,357 pieces of content in May and 5,26,866 in June as a result of automated detection.

Google said it had received over 27,700 complaints in April this year from individual users in India over alleged violation of local laws or personal rights, which resulted in the removal of 59,350 pieces of content. In its report for May, Google said it had received 34,883 complaints from individual users located in India via designated mechanisms, and the number of removal actions as a result of user complaints was 71,132. These complaints relate to third-party content that is believed to violate local laws or personal rights on Google's SSMI (significant social media intermediary) platforms, it added. The content removal was done under several categories, including copyright (70,365), defamation (753), counterfeit (5), other legal (4), circumvention (3) and graphic sexual content (2).

The company receives complaints for a variety of reasons. Each unique URL in a specific complaint is considered an individual "item". A single complaint may specify multiple items that potentially relate to the same or different pieces of content. When the company receives complaints from individual users regarding allegedly unlawful or harmful content, the assess each item to determine if the content violates Google's Community Guidelines or content policies, or meets local legal requirements for removal.  Automated detection enables Google to act more quickly and accurately to enforce its guidelines and policies. These removal actions may result in removing the content or terminating a bad actor's access to the Google service.