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Feb 27: With the window to submit comments on India's proposed personal data protection law closing on Tuesday, a period of anxious wait for final version of the Bill started for social media firms.

This comes even as global Internet companies have called on the government for improved transparency related to intermediary Guidelines (Amendment) Rules and allay fears about the prospect of increased surveillance and prompting a fragmentation of the Internet in India that would harm users.

As per the proposed amendments, an intermediary having over 50 lakh users in the country will have to be incorporated in India with a permanent registered office and address.

When required by lawful order, the intermediary shall, within 72 hours of communication, provide such information or assistance as asked for by any government agency or assistance concerning security of the state or cybersecurity.

This means that the government could pull down information provided by platforms such as Wikipedia, potentially hampering its functioning in India.

In the open letter to IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, leading browser and software development platform like Mozilla, Microsoft-owned GitHub and Cloudflare earlier called for improved transparency by allowing the public an opportunity to see a final version of these amendments prior to their enactment.

According to a Business Insider report, Indian users may lose access to Wikipedia if the new intermediary rules for internet and social media companies are approved.

Since the rules would require the website to take down content deemed illegal by the government, it would require Wikipedia to show different content for different countries.

Anusha Alikhan, senior communications director for Wikimedia told Business Insider that the platform is built though languages and not geographies. Therefore, removing content from one country, while it is still visible to other country users may not work for the company’s model.

India is one of Wikipedia’s largest markets. Over 771 million Indian users accessed the site in just November 2019.

Also read: Explained: What is the Personal Data Protection Bill and why you should care

The Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019, which was introduced in Lok Sabha in the winter session last year, was referred to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) of both the Houses.

The government last month decided to seek views and suggestions on the Bill from individuals and associations and bodies concerned and the last date for submitting the comments was on Tuesday.

Prasad, while introducing the Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019, in the Lok Sabha on December 11, announced that the draft Bill empowers the government to ask companies including Facebook, Google and others for anonymised personal data and non-personal data.

There was a buzz when the Bill's latest version was introduced in the Lok Sabha, especially the provision seeking to allow the use of personal and non-personal data of users in some cases, especially when national security is involved.

Several legal experts red-flagged the issue and said the provision will give the government unaccounted access to personal data of users in the country.

In their submission to the JPC, several organisations also flagged that the power to collect non-personal and anonymised data by the government without notice and consent should not form part of the Bill because of issues regarding effective anonymisation and potential abuse.

"Clauses 35 and 36 of the Bill provide unbridled access to personal data to the Central Government by giving it powers to exempt its agencies from the application of the Bill on the basis of various broad worded grounds," SFLC.in, a New Delhi-based not-for-profit legal services organisation, commented.

The Software Alliance, also known as BSA, a trade group which includes tech giants such as Microsoft, IBM and Adobe, among others said that the current version of the privacy bill pose substantial challenges, including the sweeping new powers for the government to acquire non-personal data, restrictions on data transfers, and local storage requirements.

"We urge the Joint Parliamentary Committee, as it considers revisions to the Bill, to eliminate provisions concerning non-personal data from the Personal Data Protection Bill and to remove the data localisation requirements and restrictions on international data flows," said Venkatesh Krishnamoorthy, Country Manager-India, BSA.

The Personal Data Protection (PDP) Bill, 2019 draws its origins from the Justice B.N. Srikrishna Committee on data privacy, which produced a draft of legislation that was made public in 2018 ("the Srikrishna Bill").

The mandatory requirement for storing a mirror copy of all personal data in India as per Section 40 of the Srikrishna Bill has been done away with in the PDP Bill, 2019, meaning that companies like Facebook and Twitter would be able to store data of Indian users abroad if they so wish.

But the bill prohibits processing of sensitive personal data and critical personal data outside India.

What is more, what constitutes critical data has not been clearly defined.

As per the proposals, social media companies will have to modify their application as they are required to have a system in place by which a user can verify themselves.

So legal experts believe that some system to upload identification documents should be there and something like the Twitter blue tick mark should be there to identify verified accounts.

"The 2019 Bill introduces a new category of data fiduciaries called social media intermediaries ('SMIs'). SMIs are a subcategory of significant data fiduciaries ('SDFs') and will be notified by the Central government after due consultation with the DPA, or the Data Protection Authority. Clause 26(4) of the Bill defines SMIs as intermediaries who primarily or solely enable online interaction between two or more users," SFLC.in said.

"On a plain reading of the definition, online platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, ShareChat and WhatsApp are likely to be notified as SMIs under the Bill," it added.

Due to impacts of COVID-19, shipments of total mobile phones are forecast to decline 14.6% in 2020, while smartphone shipments will achieve a slightly slower decline of 13.7 % year over year to total 1.3 billion units this year, according to a Gartner forecast on Tuesday.

"While users have increased the use of their mobile phones to communicate with colleagues, work partners, friends and families during lockdowns, reduced disposable income will result in fewer consumers upgrading their phones," Ranjit Atwal, Senior Research Director at Gartner, said in a statement.

"As a result, phone lifetimes will extend from 2.5 years in 2018 to 2.7 years in 2020," said Atwal.

In 2020, affordable 5G phones were expected to be the catalyst to increase phone replacements, but now it is unlikely to be the case.

5G phones are now forecast to represent only 11% of total mobile phone shipments in 2020.

"The delayed delivery of some 5G flagship phones is an ongoing issue," said Annette Zimmermann, Research Vice President at Gartner.

"Moreover, the lack of 5G geographical coverage along with the increasing cost of the 5G phone contract will impact the choice of a 5G phone."

Overall, spending on 5G phones will be impacted in most regions apart from China, where continued investment in 5G infrastructure is expected, allowing providers in China to effectively market 5G phones.

The combined global shipments PCs, tablets and mobile phones are on pace to decline 13.6% in 2020, according to the forecast.

PC shipments are expected to decline 10.5% this year. Shipments of notebooks, tablets and Chromebooks are forecast to decline slower than the PC market overall in 2020.

"The forecasted decline in the PC market in particular could have been much worse," said Atwal.

"However, government lockdowns due to COVID-19 forced businesses and schools to enable millions of people to work from home and increase spending on new notebooks, Chromebooks and tablets for those workers. Education and government establishments also increased spending on those devices to facilitate e-learning."

Gartner said that 48 per cent of employees will likely work remotely at least part of the time after the COVID-19 pandemic, compared to 30 % pre-pandemic.

Overall, the work from home trend will make IT departments shift to more notebooks, tablets and Chrome devices for work.

"This trend combined with businesses required to create flexible business continuity plans will make business notebooks displace desk based PCs through 2021 and 2022," said Atwal.

New Delhi, Jun 29: Witnessing azure skies and breathable air for the last three months, Delhi on Monday recorded deterioration in its air quality, with particulate matter with diameter of 2.5 and 10 microns -- too small to be filtered out of the human body -- standing at 52 and 297 micrograms per cubic respectively.

Gufran Beig, Project Director of System of Air Quality Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR), said that the sudden spike in air pollution is due to a mild dust storm blowing from Rajasthan.

"Since the wind direction is changing and moist air is coming in, the air quality in Delhi will become better by tomorrow," Beig told IANS.

Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) data showed that the overall air quality near Delhi Technical University (DTU) area stood at 326 micrograms per cubic, followed by 308 at Narela and 307 at Mundka.

Out of 36 stations, the AQI in as many as 30 stations was above 200 micrograms per cubic till 1 pm on Monday.

The System of Air Quality Weather Forecasting and Research categorises air quality in the 0-50 range as good, 51-100 as satisfactory, 101-200 as moderate, 201-300 as poor, 301-400 as very poor, and above 400 as severe.

According to SAFAR's website, "PM 10 (coarser dust particle) is the lead pollutant. AQI is likely to improve to moderate category by tomorrow, and further improvement is expected by July 1."

Researchers indicated that PM 10 and PM 2.5 will be 170 and 47 micrograms per cubic on Tuesday.

With no vehicles plying on the roads or industries shut due to the lockdown since March 25, Delhi's air quality had improved drastically.

According to a study conducted by the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi, if the low levels of air pollution reached during the lockdown period are maintained, India's annual death toll could reduce by 6.5 lakh.