MeitY launches online portal for users to appeal grievance redressals by social media companies

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) on February 28 launched the online portal for submitting user appeals on decisions of grievance redressal officers of platforms such as Meta, Google and others.

This platform has been brought in as part of the 2022 amendments to the Information Technology Rules, as a measure to bring more scrutiny to the grievance redressal processes of intermediaries.

The government had felt that the previous, one-tier redressal mechanism was not able to address user complaints appropriately and thus proposed the establishment of grievance appellate committees whose members include senior government officials, industry members and others.

In January, the government notified three such committees. The online GAC portal which was launched on February 28 will segregate complaints based on their subjects and will escalate to the relevant committees.

While explaining the objective of the GACs,  Minister for Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) Rajeev Chandrasekhar said, "By its (GAC) very presence, professionalism, high efficacy, it creates pressure on existing grievance redressal mechanism to perform. A lot of what you (GAC) do, will be used by MeitY to decide whether platforms, deserve to be platforms, deserve more regulations or no regulations. So you (GAC) are a good-behaviour catalyst for all the platforms to perform."

Earlier, in October 2022, in an interview with Moneycontrol, Chandrasekhar had described this platform as a "traffic light" that "will point you in the direction of the tribunal" that deals with a particular subject.

How will the platform work?

Firstly, a user has to put in their mobile numbers, following which the system will throw a one-time password. After authenticating the OTP, the user has to put in their Aadhaar number, following which the user will receive another OTP on the official number attached to their Aadhaar.

The Aadhaar authentication is a one-time process. An existing user when they re-login to the GAC portal would not be required to do the Aadhaar authentication again.

After logging in, the website redirects the user to a dashboard wherein one can keep a track of all the appeals filed. For filing a new appeal, a user has to click on the tab 'File New Appeal'.

When clicked on the File New Appeal, tab the website then redirects to a portal wherein the user has to fill in details of the grievance that they want appealed.

The portal asks for relevant documents such as a copy of the complaint made to grievance officers of the intermediary and also a copy of the decision. The GAC portal also wants the user to specify the kind of relief that is being sought by the user, apart from putting in a description of the complaint and so on.

While launching the portal on February 28, Chandrasekhar in a tweet said, "On a day when PM @narendramodi ji spoke of how Tech is transforming citizens' lives at a post-budget webinar, @GoI_MeitY launched #GAC - a faceless dispute resolution mechanism that makes all platforms - big n small accountable to DigitalNagriks."