Twitter lists jobs for compliance officers mandated by IT rules

The company, which has been accused of failing to comply with the new IT rules, has put up job listings for chief compliance officer, nodal officer and resident grievance officer. All three positions are mandated by the new rules, which require significant social media intermediaries to hire Indian citizens for these roles.

The US social media firm has been at odds with the Indian government over compliance with the IT rules for about two months now. The rules came into effect on May 26, and the government had accused Twitter of being the only platform that hadn’t hired these individuals. The micro-blogging giant had sought time from the Delhi high court, earlier, this month, to make the necessary appointments. The company cannot use the intermediary protection rules defined in Section 79 of India’s IT act, while it’s in violation of the rules.

Other companies, including Facebook, Google and WhatsApp had hired these individuals in June. While Twitter did appoint an interim compliance officer earlier, the individual had resigned within a month. Former IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had accused the platform of non-compliance on multiple occasions, and though things seem to be steadier now, newly appointed IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, had also said that the company will have to comply with the laws of the land.

Twitter isn’t the only company opposing the new IT rules though. The rules require platforms to trace the first originator of posts and messages within India, which has been opposed by messaging giant WhatsApp. The Facebook-owned company had sued the Indian government over a month ago and has not complied with that particular aspect of the IT rules.