India summons Meta executives over briefly restricted Modi Facebook post

MUMBAI - India has summoned executives from US tech giant Meta, a senior official said on July 30, after its Facebook platform briefly restricted a post by Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week.A video message by Modi posted on Meta’s Instagram platform and later shared on Facebook was restricted temporarily on the latter.A Meta spokesperson said at the time that the post had been blocked inadvertently.“We have asked Meta to come in at the highest level and explain what is happening,” S. Krishnan, secretary at the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, said on July 30.He did not say who, specifically, had been requested to appear.Meta told Indian authorities it established new protocols relating to accounts of prominent persons to prevent such a situation from recurring, Krishnan added.Meta India did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on July 30.Modi’s video post on July 23, his first addressing the massive student protests that forced Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan to resign on July 25, has more than 404 million views on Instagram.The sparring with Meta is the latest example of Modi’s government taking on Big Tech over content-related issues.India is Facebook’s biggest market by users. REUTERS