Blue Whale Challenge: Government has failed to rein in the online suicide game

An online game of fifty steps that ends with taking one's own life, the Blue Whale Challenge has stirred up internet-savvy India. After two suicides and some other attempts reported across the country, the government has now written to internet companies, directing them to remove any content which hosts Blue Whale Challenge on their platform. The Delhi High Court in a PIL filed has asked the government about the steps being taken, and has fixed the matter for hearing on 22 August. While the noble intention of the government has been welcomed, the Centre's action is at best, half hearted, insufficient as well as grossly illegal. 

The ban in effect is a letter from the Ministry of IT and Information Technology to Google India, Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Microsoft India and Yahoo India, which fails to mentions the provisions of law it is issued under. IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has also stated violation of the guidelines by any company will not be tolerated.

But without having any penalty for non-compliance, the letter seeks these companies to report on the administrator of the Blue Whale Challenge. If the government was at all serious about banning the game, it could have used powers under Section 69-A of the IT Act, 2000 and banned it throughout.

A preliminary research shows that the game started from a social media platform called VK that is popular in Russia, but surprisingly, the government has not send a copy of its letter to VK. Indian subsidiaries of foreign internet and social media companies have always negated their responsibility in India, a stand which has got support from the Centre.

In KN Govindacharya's petition before the Delhi High Court, these companies had claimed that they had no control over actions performed by parent companies based in USA and hence could not be held liable for any action or misdeed. Many a times during criminal investigations, these foreign companies have not co-operated with Indian investigative agencies as they have their servers outside, over which India has little control. It remains to be seen what steps will be taken by these subsidiaries in pursuance to this letter. 

Another way to limit the scope of the Blue Whale Challenge could be to instruct the CERT-In team to come up with technological measures that can be implemented within the Indian legal framework to handle this crisis. CERT-In is a regulatory body formed under Section 70B of the Information Technology Act, 2000. It was specifically formed to handle these kind of problems. If the government does not make use of special agencies in such situations then it might as well scrap these organisations.

Meanwhile, the Minister for Women and Child Development was oblivious to the letter by the Ministry of Information Technology. Maneka Gandhi met the Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh as well as IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Monday, seeking a ban on the Blue Whale Challenge - a full three days after the letter was sent by the IT Ministry to a few internet companies, a copy of which was also sent to Ministry for Women and Child Development. If one arm of the government is unaware about the action of the other, there is little doubt about the efficiency of the whole body.

The mobile games segment in India is booming and with 19 crores users at present, it is the fifth biggest in the world. Sixty-five per cent of children on social media are continuously exposed to adult content. Monitoring is an arduous task at which the government seems to be at sea. If the government really thinks that a letter can ban Blue Whale Challenge, then surely other illegal content too can be tackled. We must realise that it will take futuristic lawmaking as well as dedicated efforts to combat the new age demons. Life may be a game, but there is surely no god-mode.