Govt cracks down on Facebook, YouTube over ‘illegal content’
Operators of more than 1,000 Facebook and YouTube pages will be arrested unless they take down the content in the next 15 days, the government warned today.
The Digital Economy and Society Ministry gave no reason for why it was censoring the 1,129 URLs but said they violated the Computer Crime Act.
Minister Buddhipongse Punnakanta said on Tuesday (August 11) that evidence of illegal online media will be collected and checked within two days. After that, the cases will be sent the courts, and then to the police or to foreign platform operators so that offenders can be arrested or illegal content deleted.
Facebook and YouTube have over the years removed thousands of pages deemed insulting to the monarchy.
Buddhipongse said his ministry had discovered illegal content at 1,500 internet sites during April and June – 1,365 Facebook pages and 135 YouTube accounts.
However, so far only 236 URLs had been closed in response to the ministry’s order, while 1,129 were still available.
The ministry has sent a letter of notice to the operators of the 1,129 URLs, urging them to remove their pages or posts within 15 days or they may face charges under the Computer Crime Act 2007.