Government in talks with social media platforms on age-gating, tougher deepfake rules

Ashwini Vaishnaw

The government is in active discussions with social media platforms to implement age-gating mechanisms and introduce stronger safeguards against deepfakes, Union IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on February 17.

Vaishnaw said age-gating-based regulation is a key requirement under the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act and will focus on restricting the processing and use of children’s personal data on digital platforms.

“We are in dialogue with industry for stronger regulation on deepfakes, above and beyond the current IT Rules framework,” he said.

He also stressed that multinational technology companies must adhere to the local context of the countries they operate in, noting that most platforms are already making efforts to align with national laws and regulations.