Tech giants should re-invest profits in India to generate jobs says Ravi Shankar Prasad

 NEW DELHI: The government asked the global social media and IT giants to re-invest revenues and profits in India which would help generating jobs in the country.

“Any efforts to influence electoral processes in India by social media and internet companies will be met with punishment and fines,” said the government at the G20 Digital Economy Ministerial meeting. “It is only fair and just that some of the revenue and profit generated from these platforms be equitably re-invested opportunities for the people there,” said Ravi Shankar Prasad at the G20 meeting.

He added saying, “While cyberspace is truly global, it must be linked with local ideas, local culture and local vies. The Indian Supreme Court, while upholding the right to privacy has also elaborated these aspects and we must have a fine balance between data availability, data innovation, data anonymity and data privacy. We need data to improve business but the data must be anonymous, objective and taken with consent.”

India has taken serious note of reported misuse of social media platforms to manipulate electoral processes and change voter minds. He said, “Such platforms will never be allowed  to abuse our election process for extraneous means. The purity of the democratic process should never be compromised and India will take all requisite steps to deter and punish those who seek to vitiate this process. India is taking all possible steps to make the cyberspace absolutely safe and any act of cyber crime or cyber threat will be dealt with severely.”