intermediaries and authors of content, it is not clear to what extent it has reduced takedowns. Google, for example, received the highest number of requests for the highest number of items ever in 2016; its compliance rate was only marginally higher than that in 2014, before the judgement in Shreya Singhal v. Union of India was pronounced.104 In the case of Facebook, however, a drastic reduction can be observed: in 2016, the year that Facebook started to implement the judgement, it took down 2,753 pieces of content, compared to more than 30,000 the year before, and more than 10,000 in 2014. Facebook takes down content mostly under India’s laws protecting religious beliefs and the sentiments of communities, as well as the protection of national symbols.105 Whether or not government-requested takedowns have decreased, it deserves to be pointed out that big tech companies in India, such as Amazon, reportedly also resort to tremendous amounts of self-censorship. “Nobody wants bad PR or government ire in an important market over a little nudity or a dead cow,” as Pranav Dixit has reported.106 Intermediaries and copyright While section 79 of the IT Act might govern intermediary liability in general, additional provisions for intermediary liability are included in the Copyright (Amendment) Act, 2012. For those who seek to quickly remove material that they disagree with from the internet, this amended version of the Indian Copyright Act, 1957, might in many cases provide an all-too-easy route through which to do so. At the heart of the regime around intermediary liability and copyright that has emerged in India is the case of Super Cassettes Industries Ltd. v. Myspace Inc.107 In this case, the former sought to hold social network MySpace liable for copyright infringement. In his judgment, Justice Singh referred to section 81 of the IT (Amendment) Act, 2008, to argue that the safe harbour provisions in the IT Act did not apply in this case. Section 81 of the IT Act states that “nothing in this Act shall restrict any person from exercising any right conferred under the Copyright 104 Google Transparency Report: Government requests to remove content. https://www.transparencyreport.google.com/ government-removals/by-country/IN 105 Facebook (2016). Government requests report. https://www. govtrequests.facebook.com/country/India/2016-H2/ 106 Dixit, P. (2017, 12 July). American Tech Companies Are So Afraid Of Offending Indians That They’re Censoring All Their Products. Buzzfeed News. https://www.buzzfeed.com/pranavdixit/whysilicon-valley-is-censoring-itself-as-it-expands-in?utm_term=. ry6qKDEboD#.jcApR71bJ7 107 Super Cassettes Industries Ltd. v. Myspace Inc. 2011 (48) PTC 49 (Del). Act, 1957.” With this, Justice Singh pointed out a crucial lacuna in the law. The gap was partially resolved in 2012 when several amendments to the Copyright Act of 1957 were passed in Parliament. Two of these entail a limited safe harbour provision, and thus have direct import for internet intermediaries. The first amendment, section 52(1)(b) in the new Act of 2012, absolves intermediaries from liability for copyright infringement where the storage of infringing content is “transient or incidental” and part of a purely technical process of transmission or communication. The second amendment, section 51(1)(c) in the amended Act, does the same when the transient or incidental storage of content is “for the purpose of providing electronic links, access or integration,” on the condition that doing so “has not been expressly prohibited by the rights holder” and “unless the person responsible is aware or has reasonable grounds for believing that such storage is of an infringing copy.” The amendment further states that “if the person responsible for the storage of the copy has received a written complaint from the owner of copyright in the work” claiming copyright infringement, the former is obliged to disable access to the content in question for a period of 21 days, or until receiving a court order. “In case no such order is perceived before the expiry of such period of 21 days, [the person responsible for the storage of the copy] may continue to provide the facility of such access.” As Sunil Abraham has pointed out,108 the amendment clearly privileges the concerns of intellectual property rights-holders, as the intermediary is obliged under the law to remove the content in question even before the validity of the complaint has been proved. Because of this, the mechanism provided for under the amended Copyright Act is likely to have a chilling effect on free speech. Moreover, the likelihood of ISPs automatically and voluntarily reinstating content once the legal waiting period of three weeks has passed and no court order has been received, is low. Abraham’s colleague Pranesh Prakash goes even a step further. If the complaint turns out to be false – either because the complainant is not the rights-holder or because the content does not entail a violation of the rights-holder’s copyright – there 108 Abraham, S. (2012, 10 June). Copyright amendment: bad, but could have been much worse. Smart Investor. www. smartinvestor.business-standard.com/market/Compnews-120087Compnewsdet-Sunil_Abraham_Copyright_amendment_bad_but_ could_have_been_much_worse.htm#.WaZ9h98xDec 70 / Unshackling Expression