Social media companies list out worries as Centre readies data protection law

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Social media intermediaries have pointed to undoing behavioural tracking of children, verifiable parental consent (VPC) and targeted advertisements as the biggest concerns with the data law.

The Rules for the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act, which will provide teeth for enforcement of the law, are expected soon, and companies are hoping the government will address their concerns.

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Section 9 of the DPDP Act, which was notified in the Gazette in August last year disallows behavioural tracking of children on digital platforms.

This prohibits companies from keeping track of a child’s activity online which in turn has an impact on the effectiveness of their safety features.

A social media intermediary’s executives told ET, “There are some signals we must pick up of our users, of adults and children, to inform the effectiveness of our safety features.”

“We’re working with the ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY) and other stakeholders to figure out a pragmatic, balanced approach to ensure privacy and safety of teenagers. We should be able to do as platforms do, the things that protect young users,” the executive said.

Google, Google-owned YouTube, Meta, X (formerly Twitter), and Snap did not respond to ET’s requests for a