Meta apologises to government over restricted Modi video

Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg apologised to the Indian government, through Chief Global Affairs Officer Joel Kaplan, for Facebook taking down a video of Prime Minister Narendra Modi reaching out to student protesters and for the company's lapses related to child sexual abuse material, deepfake content and errors in operating its platforms, officials told the Times of India, officials said Meta blamed technical glitches, and Kaplan said in a statement that he had apologised to Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw for the error restricting the post. The apology followed a three-day ultimatum from a parliamentary standing committee headed by BJP's Nishikant Dubey, which had warned Meta to either apologise or risk losing its intermediary safe-harbour protection. Officials said Meta acknowledged that significant sums had been paid to boost certain categories of content and separately accepted that paid promotion had amplified illegal content for specific audiences, and promised corrective steps. Authorities told Meta it could lose safe-harbour status if it actively selected who received content through algorithms or paid promotion.