Parliamentary Panel Grills Twitter Executives Over Whistleblower’s Claims: Report

A parliamentary panel on Friday (August 26) reportedly grilled top Twitter executives over allegations that the social media giant knowingly allowed the Indian government to put its ‘agent’ on the company’s payrolls.

The members of the Standing Committee on Communications and Information Technology gave Twitter executives a ‘dressing down’ as their replies on issues of data security and privacy were not ‘satisfactory’, news agency PTI reported quoting sources.

Twitter’s senior director of public policy Samiran Gupta and director of public policy Shagufta Kamran deposed before the committee and presented their views. 

The panel had summoned Twitter executives to hear their views on the issue of ‘citizens’ data security and privacy.

According to a report in the Washington Post on August 23, Twitter’s former head of security Peiter Zatko alleged that the Indian government forced the social media company to put one of its ‘agents’ on its payroll with ‘unsupervised access to the company systems and user data’ at a time when intense protests were happening across the country.

The panel questioned the officials of the social media giant on these claims. Twitter executives denied the allegations and refused that any data security breach took place in India. 

The members also grilled Twitter officials on the process of handling conflicts with regards to national privacy policies of different countries. The members of the panel also sought answers on Twitter’s privacy policy and whether the social media giant’s policies were in sync with local norms. 

Sources privy to the development were quoted as saying that Twitter executives did not give satisfactory replies and evaded questions about data safety and privacy. 

Headed by Member of Parliament (MP) Shashi Tharoor, the panel comprises 21 members from Lok Sabha and 4 from Rajya Sabha. 

Congress MP Karti Chidambaram, TRS MP Ranjith Reddy, TMC MP Mahua Moitra, BJP’s Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore and CPI(M)’s John Brittas also attended the hearing on Friday.

Twitter is currently locked in a legal battle with the union government. In July, the US-based microblogging site moved the Karnataka High Court (HC) seeking quashing of 39 ‘blocking orders’ issued by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) under Section 69A of the IT Act.

Twitter, in its petition, alleged that the government was lately ordering the platform to block accounts without specifying which tweets warranted the ban. 

Not just Twitter, other big tech platforms such as Google, Amazon and Meta have also been under increased government scrutiny over a slew of issues. While Amazon faces charges of anti-competitive behaviour, the social media platforms have been in dock for non-compliance with government orders and failure to act on ‘fake news.’

Earlier on August 26, the Tharoor-led panel was also briefed by IRCTC officials over a contentious plan that sought to monetise data of train travellers. Deposing before the panel, IRCTC executives said that the plan was shelved and the e-tender withdrawn.