On June 25, US-based microblogging site Twitter had temporarily blocked former IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad’s personal account on the platform under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
While responding to the Parliamentary Panel for Information Technology (IT) led by Tharoor, social media giant told the Parliamentary Standing Committee on IT that it had informed Prasad about the temporary block of his account due to an alleged violation of DMCA. Similarly, the Twitter account of the Chairman of the Panel Shashi Tharoor, was locked as well.
Subsequently, the panel had sought a written explanation from Twitter “to know the grounds on which the site had locked the account.” The social networking platform replied that as per its copyright policy, it responds to copyright complaints under under the DMCA.
It added that regarding Prasad and Tharoor, Twitter had received DMCA notices from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) alleging that videos uploaded by them on their accounts infringed Sony Music Entertainment-owned copyrighted works. Moreover, it cited the original works based on which the infringement notices were sent.
For the former IT Minister, it said that the DMCA notice was in reference to A.R. Rahman’s original work of Maa Tujhe Salaam and concerning Congress MP Tharoor, the DMCA notice was in reference to Boney M’s Rasputin.
