Intermediaries And Their Tryst With The Law

Introduction

While the concept of intermediaries has been on the statute book since 2000, there has lately been an increasing discourse on their responsibilities and regulation. The Information Technology Act, 2000 ("IT Act") defines an intermediary as any person who on behalf of another person receives, stores or transmits an electronic record or provides any service with respect to that record¹. The definition is exhaustive in nature and includes telecom service providers, network service providers, internet service providers, web-hosting service providers, search engines, online payment sites, online-auction sites, online-market places and cyber cafes.

The power and potentiality of intermediaries such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter is vast and runs across borders. The content on these platforms has the ability to influence vast sections of opinions. The Supreme Court recently rejected the contention of one of the global intermediaries (Facebook) that it is