A legal notice has been served seeking removal of Facebook posts and YouTube videos containing “fake and concocted news to incite violence and public disorder” in Bangladesh.
Barrister Arafat Hosen Khan of Bangladesh Supreme Court served the notice to Facebook, YouTube and the government authorities on behalf of his clients –Advocate Nilufer Anjum, and Md. Ashraful Islam. He also attached a few links of Facebook and YouTube contents with the notice.
“Popular social media like Facebook and YouTube certainly plays a very helpful and important role for exercising our right to freedom of speech but we must remember not to encourage violence and vandalism to destabilize the country in the name of exercising our right to freedom of speech. In this regard, all authorities including BTRC, Digital Security Agency, Facebook, YouTube, etc. must play a more conscious role according to the existing laws of Bangladesh,” Barrister Khan told Bangladesh Post.
He served the notice to Sabhanaz Rashid Diya, Head of Public Policy of Facebook, Bangladesh, Meta Platform Inc. (Facebook), YouTube LL.C for their “inactions and failure to discharge their statutory duties to regulate, monitor, take down and remove contents in online social and/or digital media platforms infringing the sovereignty, integrity and security of the State; public order; and misleading information tarnishing the image of the State organs”.
This is the violative of the provisions of Articles 27, 31, 39 and 44 of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh read with Sections 30, 64, 76, 97A of the Bangladesh Telecommunication Act, 2001, Sections 8, 13, 16, 25 of the Digital Security Act, 2018 and Section 46 of the Information and Communication Technology Act, 2006 (as amended in 2013), according to the notice.
The notice was also sent to the Bangladesh government authorities such as Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC), Digital Security Agency, Inspector General of Police (IGP), secretaries of posts, telecommunications and information technology, Information and Communication Technology Division, Public Security Division of Ministry of Home, and the Security Services Division.
It has been said in their legal notice that, in recent past it has been observed that the Facebook and YouTube do not apply any supervisory mechanism or have control over its contents especially in Bangladesh, while a large number of fake news, contents, images, videos containing obscene and damaging the images of various political figures, intellectuals, tarnishing the image of Bangladesh as a nation, disclosing various sensitive issues relating to international policies, broadcasting misleading and twisted information through various Facebook users and YouTube subscribers inside and outside Bangladesh with an object to diminish the country’s image.
Further in order to tarnish Bangladesh’s image as a failed State towards the international community and to create turmoil within Bangladesh, a vested quarter both inside and outside Bangladesh are purportedly circulating propagandas.
It has also been said in the legal notice that due to the recent post COVID-19 economic upsurge and international crisis resulting from the Russia-Ukraine war, the whole world is undergoing a serious economic crisis. As a part of this global economy, Bangladesh is not an exception to this global economic unrest.
Various other countries including a number of western countries are undergoing serious inflation, unemployment issues, increase of price hike, scarcity of foods and above all a global increase of oil price.
“Ironically, the same vested quarters are manipulating this global phenomenon with a heinous object to create an abnormal situation, public disorder, civil disobedience, threat to national security and above all spoiling the government's image.
“By using Facebook and YouTube as a medium, a number of Facebook users (both in individual as well as group user’s capacity) and YouTube users and subscribers are spreading rumours and propagandas to embarrass the government into a delicate situation.
“However, due to the lack of regulation from the BTRC and DSA and absence of foresight and deliberate ignorance from Facebook and YouTube’s recently various frivolous, fictitious and fake news are being widely circulated through the Facebook and YouTube mediums to incite violence and public disorder," mentioned in the legal notice.
