'Banning social media threat to democracy'

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Banning or blocking websites and social content on the Web is a threat to democracy and the freedom of speech of the netizens, cyber security expert and ehthical hacker Ankit Fadia said Tuesday.

"Banning or blocking websites and social content on Web is a threat to the democracy and the freedom of speech of the netizens," Fadia told reporters here at the launch of his 15th book, How To Unblock Everything On The Internet.

"Government's demand that Google and Facebook be held liable for malicious content is unreasonable," he added.

Fadia said his new book would teach "non-technical users how to unblock access to everything on Internet".

According to him, the book targets college students and office-goers, who often face censorship by their respective institutions while accessing social networks from the classrooms or offices and the book provides basic tools to bypass the institutional blocking mechanisms.

Fadia further said that despite effective cyber crime laws in place, India's cyber security is not up to the mark due to lack of trained security personnel dealing with the issue.

"Our laws are good, but we need to train our security forces in cyber security technologies. The cyber security of India is not as good as the countries like America," said Fadia.