Yahoo! Seeks to Avoid Lawsuit in India

Yahoo! filed to be removed from a mass lawsuit against various social networking sites reportedly accused of hosting offensive religious content. The lawsuit in question has stood, despite Information...
Yahoo! Seeks to Avoid Lawsuit in India
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  • Yahoo! filed to be removed from a mass lawsuit against various social networking sites reportedly accused of hosting offensive religious content. The lawsuit in question has stood, despite Information Technology Minister Kapil Sibal recently denying that the Indian government supports internet censorship.

    During a Dehli district court hearing on the matter, lawyers for Yahoo! pointed out that the company was made part of the lawsuit “on the patently mistaken assumption that it is a social networking website.” The lawsuit, which was filed by a member of the public to warrant censorship against user content that might be offensive to Muslims, is a “complete abuse of the process of law,” the defense went on to say, adding that there should be “no cause of action” against Yahoo!, according to AFP.

    So far, Google and Facebook amongst 21 other social networking sites named in the suit, have reportedly erased the offensive content in question from their servers, and have appealed to the Delhi High Court, seeking their cases dropped on the basis that they cannot be held responsible for the actions of their users. Sibal has went on to add that the Indian government only requires websites to follow the same rules as the press.

    Yahoo! must be scratching their heads on this one.

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