Social media platforms face House panel heat

NEW DELHI: Social media platforms cannot operate like news media without accountability, India’s parliamentary panel on information technology told representatives of Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram, who appeared before it on Wednesday.

The 31-member parliamentary panel is considering whether social media platforms are aggregators or selectors of content. Stepping up their scrutiny, members of the panel questioned the representatives over three keys issues—allegations that they acted as a lobby group in various countries, the scope of human intervention in their processes and whether or not they had ombudsmen in place for grievance redressal.