00:00Propaganda exposed
00:09Global clicks, local chaos
00:15From Red Fort Blast to Bihar ballot battle
00:21Narrative Ninjas behind screens unmasked
00:42Who is driving the digital storm?
00:46That is a big India to the exclusion
00:55This is NewsTrack and I'm Maria Shakil
00:57Geopolitics is ultimately a game of power
01:00And while many nations avoid physical battlefields
01:04They are now fighting on a different one
01:07This is the digital battlefield
01:10A new kind of weapon is trending
01:12One that doesn't use missiles
01:15But narratives
01:17And a new transparency feature on X
01:20Has opened a Pandora's box
01:22Rolled out over the weekend
01:24The about this account feature
01:27Reveals a user's actual country and region
01:30Based on internet activity
01:32And not what they claim in their bio
01:35It also shows how often a user name has been changed
01:39A key indicator of suspicious behaviour
01:42The world is seeing what many suspected for years
01:46That coordinated political campaigns are being run by accounts
01:49Pretending to be local citizens
01:52In the United States, foreign accounts posing as Americans
01:56Were exposed while promoting the MAGA campaign
02:00In India, the impact is even more significant
02:03In fact, India Today's OSINT team
02:06Has found thousands of accounts posing as Indian users
02:11While operating from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and West Asia
02:15They were deeply involved in conversations on politically sensitive issues
02:20Such as the farmers' protests
02:22The NRCCAA protests
02:26And also during the recently concluded Bihar elections
02:31Let me give you one example
02:33Chatur Vey Diswat
02:36This account has a profile photo of an Indian woman
02:40There is a Jai Hind in the bio
02:43Posts Indian national issues
02:45But X shows it is based in Pakistan
02:48Our OSINT team has found
02:51That there were thousands of posts
02:53Criticising the centre
02:54And this account is a clear example
02:56Of how narratives are being weaponised
02:59So what does this mean?
03:01These narratives
03:03In fact, these operators
03:06Are shaping opinions
03:07Manipulating trends
03:09And infiltrating online communities
03:11And this isn't the first time
03:13That social media
03:14Or social media influencer
03:16Has been used
03:17To peddle propaganda
03:19We have seen an influencer
03:20Being groomed
03:21To push pro-Pakistan narratives
03:23Jyoti Malhotra
03:25This lady
03:26A travel vlogger
03:28Showcased curated propaganda
03:31This brings me to the question
03:32That we are asking on the show tonight
03:34That for a digital battlefield
03:37Where opinions can be shaped across borders
03:40Without us even realising it
03:42So what really is going to happen
03:44In days and months to come?
03:45Are there enough laws?
03:48And how should the legal perspective be shaped?
03:51Joining me on the show tonight
03:53Enes Nappi Nai
03:54Is an advocate of the Supreme Court
03:55And founder of Cyber Saathi
03:57We have Veena Sikri
03:59Former Indian diplomat
04:00Kanish Gaur is a technology expert
04:03And we also have
04:04Senior editor of the OSINT team
04:06Ankit Kumar
04:07Ankit, I am going to begin with you
04:09As someone
04:10And also
04:11Dr. Pawan Dugal
04:13Advocate of the Supreme Court
04:14Joins us as well
04:15Ankit, beginning with you
04:17The challenge certainly is
04:19Of realising
04:21The scale at which
04:23These, you know
04:25Propaganda
04:26Ideas are operating
04:28So when we take this example
04:30Of Bihar elections
04:31Can you give us a sense
04:32Of how many such accounts
04:34Fake accounts
04:35Were operating
04:36And they had an opinion
04:37On Bihar elections
04:38And whose side were they peddling for?
04:41So, there are three aspects
04:42To this entire thing
04:43First is the domestic political issue
04:45As you rightly said
04:46The Bihar elections
04:47Is one example
04:48The reason why our team
04:49Had the ability to go through
04:51All the disinformation campaigns
04:52Is because we already have been tracking
04:53A lot of coordinated campaigns
04:54When we say coordinated campaigns
04:55What we mean is that
04:56Batch accounts
04:57Posting
04:58Similar posts
04:59Or sometimes
05:00100% copy based jobs
05:01And trying to propagate
05:02One narrative
05:03So, I will give you one example
05:04Of foreign accounts
05:06Interfering in India's domestic political scene
05:22Last year there was a violence in Sambal
05:25For those who don't know
05:26Sambal is in the Pradesh
05:28There was a communal tension
05:29We have evidence to show that
05:32that Pakistan-based account, which if you see their bio, their identity, they pretend
05:40to be India-based, Uttar Pradesh-based citizens, they have made very sensitive, very aggressive
05:47comments, which had the ability to cause communal tension.
05:52So, we have those kind of accounts.
05:54In Bihar election, Marias, there are accounts which are based in Pakistan, but have kind
06:00of criticized the policies of the central government.
06:03I will give you two other aspects.
06:05One is geopolitical.
06:08Six months before, Sheikh Hasina was toppled, her government was toppled out of power in
06:14Bangladesh.
06:15Our team did a story.
06:16We had established that there was a massive anti-India campaign going on, which was linked
06:23to thousands of accounts based in UK.
06:25Before that, we had already seen one such campaign in Maldives, which was the India Out
06:30campaign, which an EU body established that had footprints of foreign influence operations.
06:37And then there is security angle.
06:40Back in 2020, during India-China conflict, there was this famous account of Cathy Rolanova, a
06:46Russia-based security expert.
06:48And everything she posted was kind of, you know, taken at face value because the profile
06:54belonged to a Russia-based military blogger.
06:56So, you have security angle, you have domestic political angle, and as you rightly said, there
07:01is geopolitical angle.
07:02Yes, absolutely.
07:03Dr. Dugal, you know, many would say that X has used this feature that will detect and
07:09reveal the origin, the geographical origins of user accounts.
07:14But if they are, you know, influencing narratives at this scale, and there is a coordinated
07:21campaign, hate campaigns also, then what can countries such as ours do?
07:28What legal protections do we have?
07:32Currently, we do not have adequate protections under applicable Indian law.
07:37The Information Technology Act 2000 is completely silent on fake news.
07:41Similarly, the Bharatiya Nyai Sahita also does not have adequate provisions, though we can
07:48try to bring fake news publication under the broad ambit of electronic forgery for purposes
07:54of cheating or harming repetition of another's under the BRS.
07:58However, that's not going to be sufficient.
08:01Please remember, we are now the largest democracy in the world.
08:05We are now the most populous nation in the world.
08:08And we are also now the most hungry AI population in the world.
08:13More and more population in India is quickly adapting to AI than in any other country.
08:18Therefore, trying to peddle, trying to create, disseminate, forward or distribute a particular
08:24narrative becomes very easy in the Indian context.
08:27The absence of a dedicated law on fake news or fake information rather complicates the entire
08:33scenario.
08:33India needs to learn from countries like Thailand, from Singapore, from France and come up with
08:40dedicated legal provisions, number one.
08:42Number two, India is very, very soft on intermediaries and service providers.
08:46Gone are the days where we must treat the intermediaries with a hallowed kind of an approach around them.
08:52You have to make intermediaries and service providers responsible.
08:56They cannot be allowed to be mute spectators.
08:58Section 79, 2C says that these intermediaries must exercise due diligence while they discharge
09:05their obligations under the law.
09:07However, the government has still not specified the minimum requirements for due diligence
09:12specifically in the context of publication, distribution or dissemination of fake information.
09:18Barring one particular line under the IT rules 2021, we have nothing much to do.
09:22And I think the intermediaries need to be made responsible for the fake news that gets generated
09:29on the platform.
09:30And they must be asked to remove the fake news within two hours.
09:34The current time limit or limit of 15 days is a time limit that got potentially got a reference
09:41to the dinosaur age.
09:43Today, fake news or the fake narrative changes people's perspectives instantaneously.
09:48So hence, that content needs to be removed at the earliest possible but not later than
09:54two hours.
09:55Anything beyond two hours will cause an impact upon the sovereignty, security and integrity
10:00of India.
10:01So a lot of work needs to be done.
10:02Yes, absolutely.
10:03And the fact is that X has done it.
10:06Other social media platforms should also come in.
10:08So Ambassador Sikri, many would say that foreign-based accounts trying to influence conversations
10:15in India on social media platforms may not be new.
10:20We were aware of it, particularly during the farmers' protests, that there were a lot
10:25of Khalistani accounts trying to influence the narrative here in India.
10:30In terms of geopolitical implications, can India take it up with any foreign country that
10:38these accounts are based in your country, the action must be initiated there?
10:43Can that be done?
10:45Of course, we can take it up if we are quite sure that this is the case.
10:49So I think while the talk, as you are quite rightly saying, the suspicion that this was
10:53happening, that foreign hands were influencing, was always there.
10:57It was always being discussed also among the agencies, among the media and so on.
11:02But there was never any proof.
11:04I do think that this new feature on X by Elon Musk and his group is very valuable.
11:11It will prevent misinformation.
11:13It will allow early detection.
11:15Because actually, the moment we were discussing, as you always did, that this is caused by fake
11:20news from abroad, everybody would say, oh, you're just talking of the foreign hand.
11:24You know, you're just blaming it on the foreign hand.
11:26But now, with this new feature, which I hope stays on and is not altered or changed, and
11:33X has done an excellent initiative, Twitter, you know, the new X has done an excellent
11:38initiative in taking this about the account, saying when it was started, which country,
11:44how many times you changed your name, all a lot of valuable information.
11:48And if such valuable information is continued to be provided on this channel, it will really
11:54help Indian agencies and the individuals in tracking down these accounts.
12:00I think I agree fully that in building up a fake narrative, or when somebody is trying
12:05to build up a fake narrative, time is of the essence.
12:08So if we want to detect it quickly, such things will help a lot.
12:11But we also need the internal laws and regulations, which will allow such cases to be tried quickly.
12:17So in this case, we have to look into issues like the Bharatiya Niaya Samhita and other
12:23aspects of tracking down fake news, of misinformation, of maligning somebody, of, you know, trying
12:31to put pressure through wrong means, political pressure or non-political pressure.
12:35All these are very important realities of today, but perhaps they are not reflected adequately
12:40in our Bharatiya Niaya Samhita, because these things are changing, they have to be updated
12:46very often, but I'm sure the government is looking into that and these changes will be
12:50made.
12:51But all in all, this is a very, very valuable addition and I hope it stays on.
12:56Yes, but as you pointed out rightly, Ambassador Sikri, that it will not prevent fake news.
13:02At best, it will lead to an early detection.
13:05So coming on this, Kanishk, this feature detects and reveals the geographical origin of user
13:13accounts.
13:14But when it is about the larger technological strengths and limitations of this feature,
13:20especially regarding VPN and proxy users, what does it do?
13:25See, we are living in the age of information warfare and narratives are being set globally.
13:33You have organized criminal groups, organizations.
13:38We've heard of Cambridge Analytica, which did election interference.
13:41Now it is interference, which is not done during elections only.
13:46It is propaganda narrative warfare, which is done throughout the year.
13:50So today you have cyber criminals, which use proxy VPNs to hide their identity.
13:58Mind you, if you see a X account, which appears to be coming from outside India, it's not necessarily
14:05it might be sitting outside India.
14:07It could be sitting right within India and it would be set by an organized cyber criminal
14:13group.
14:14And we have seen this happening.
14:16I investigated a case of Nupur Sharma, where I looked at hate propaganda, which was targeted
14:22on Nupur Sharma.
14:23And a lot of these accounts were originating from Pakistan when we did deep analysis.
14:29And every account was pointing towards India.
14:33But when we did deep analysis, we did further investigation.
14:37We were able to point out that this was a DGISPR propaganda, which was being put to create
14:43physical unrest in India.
14:45So right now what we are seeing is information warfare, narrative warfare, and it is impacting
14:50India in a big way.
14:52It can impact physical conflicts on ground as well.
14:56So then, Dr. Dugal, what legal steps could be taken to hold foreign actors accountable
15:01for meddling in Indian political conversations online?
15:05First and foremost, we need to realize that Indian sovereignty is supreme and no foreign power
15:11has got any kind of a right to interfere in the internal affairs of India.
15:16Indian sovereignty needs to be expanded to include cyber sovereignty.
15:20I recently coined a new concept known as artificial intelligence sovereignty, which includes the
15:25right of the sovereign nation to go ahead and have its sovereignty over all AI algorithms,
15:31which are available in its territorial boundaries, independent of whether they are physically
15:36located in the country or not.
15:38Apart from the sovereignty of the country to develop its own sovereign large language models,
15:43number one.
15:44Number two, I think we need to come up with, as a low-hanging fruit, immediate due diligence
15:49parameters under Section 87 of the Information Technology Act 2000, where the central government,
15:56without going to parliament, comes up with these rules and regulations specifically stipulating
16:00the specific due diligence parameters that must be mandatarily adopted by intermediaries
16:07in the matters pertaining to fake narratives or fake news.
16:11And if they fail to do so, then they are automatically stripped of their statutory exemption from legal liability.
16:17Number three, we will have to have a dedicated law on fake news because that's going to be
16:22the need of the hour.
16:23And number four, it's intrinsically also connected with the need of India to have a dedicated new
16:29national legislation on artificial intelligence.
16:32Let's remember that a big chunk of this so-called fake narrative is getting generated using artificial
16:38intelligence.
16:39Hence, if we are not going to regulate the misuse of AI for disseminating fake news or for criminal
16:45purposes, we are actually going to miss the bus.
16:47But finally, it will ultimately also be responsible to create adequate public awareness campaigns
16:53by the government, by AI stakeholders, by the cyber stakeholders, to the normal digital user.
17:01Please do not believe what you see.
17:04Please learn to be stingy in sharing your information.
17:08Please learn to be suspicious of any and every information that you see.
17:11Till such time, you've independently verified the authenticity or veracity of the same.
17:17We all have to work together.
17:18The law is only having one component.
17:20We need to enforce existing provisions of law with great vigor.
17:25But ultimately, we need to have new legal frameworks.
17:28And we'll have to imbibe a service of cyber resilience by sensitizing users not to rely upon such content.
17:37And in the context of elections, the Election Commission of India has a humongous role to play
17:41to ensure that this kind of fake information or fake news, whether done through deep twigs
17:46or otherwise, does not prejudicially impact the holding of free, fair and independent elections
17:51in the Indian context.
17:53Okay, certainly.
17:54Kanishk, 30 seconds to you.
17:56And then I'll give the last word to the senior editor for Sint, Ankit.
18:00Kanishk, we are looking at a challenge of a different nature.
18:03And the fact is that increasingly the entire conversation and the warfare is being played online.
18:10It is about public trust or activism which is happening online.
18:15Then uncovering of these foreign origin accounts, how does it really help a nation?
18:20It will be essentially communicating to the public, be aware.
18:25Besides the awareness campaign, what else can it do?
18:30It can create psychological warfare where people could really get hooked on to fake news,
18:38misinformation, which is propagated through a network of botnets, through a network of deepfakes.
18:45So people can get in a state of panic and it can influence their mindset, who they like, who they don't like.
18:53For example, the recent bomb blast which happened, the way it was broadcasted per se,
18:59it was seen as there is a new element of warfare which is being planned against India.
19:05And there is a specific community which was being suffered massively and doctors of specific community were being targeted
19:15while they were trying to talk about their freedom of expression or their fundamental rights.
19:22But actually, if you look at the threat actors who were doing all of this,
19:26were information warfare specialists sitting right across the border,
19:30trying to create a narrative on Twitter, X and also on Facebook.
19:35Okay, Ankit.
19:35So what you need to do is,
19:37Okay, let me bring in Ankit quickly now.
19:39I have just 30 seconds left on the show.
19:40Ankit, this is about X.
19:42But conversations are being generated also on Instagram, also on Facebook.
19:47What about these platforms?
19:50So X is important, Maria, because X might not have the largest footprints.
19:55Yes, because the nature of conversation is shifting.
19:59It has now moved to Instagram on YouTube.
20:02That's where the new warfare is.
20:04That's where the audience is being fought for.
20:07But X, Maria, is still the go-to platform for people like us,
20:12the journalists, the policy makers, the government officials.
20:15So if you see the ecosystem of information in the social media universe,
20:19it originally, in most cases, it starts from X,
20:23then travels through platforms like Instagram, through multimedia,
20:27and then through videos and podcasts.
20:29Origin in most cases is usually X.
20:33That is why X generally becomes the hub of these information campaigns.
20:37One suggestion that I would like to give, maybe it is practical,
20:41you know, before every election, there is model code of conduct.
20:44Everybody is kind of supposed to follow,
20:47even media, the newspapers, we are supposed to follow the guidelines.
20:51But why can't the Election Commission of India add a line,
20:55issuing an order, guideline, for the big tech involved in India?
20:59Why can't the social media, the big social media platforms,
21:03come under model code of conduct for today's...
21:06That certainly is a thought.
21:07That certainly is a thought, Ankit.
21:09Ankit, Ms. Nappin, Dr. Dugal, Kanish Gaur,
21:13and Ambassador Sikri, really appreciate your time.
21:15Of course, there will be several other aspects and several stories
21:18which will be brought out by the OSINT team of India today.
21:22That's all from me. I'll be seeing you tomorrow.
21:24Thanks so much for watching.
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