The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has issued a new Standard Operating Procedure (SoP) aimed at speeding up the removal of Non-Consensual Intimate Imagery (NCII) from online platforms and strengthening protections for victims. The move comes in line with directions of the Madras High Court (W.P. No. 25017/2025, order dated 15 July 2025).
Under the new protocol, online intermediaries must take down NCII content within 24 hours of receiving a complaint from an affected individual, an authorised representative, or a government agency.
This includes: (i) any content that exposes the private areas of an individual; (ii) images or videos showing a person in full or partial nudity; (iii) material depicting an individual engaged in any sexual act or conduct; and (iv) artificially morphed images of the individual that create or suggest such intimate or sexual content.
Clear Guidelines for Victims and Platforms
The government has laid out multiple reporting routes to make it easier for victims to flag such content. Complaints can be filed through One Stop Centres (OSCs), in-app reporting systems of social media companies, the National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP), or local police stations. Victims can also dial 1930 for assistance.
The SoP mandates strict timelines: all intermediaries must act within 24 hours, while Significant Social Media Intermediaries (SSMIs) are required to deploy hash-matching and crawler technologies to prevent the re-upload of the same or similar content. Platforms must also coordinate with the Ministry of Home Affairs’ Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C) through the Sahyog portal.
Stronger Inter-Agency Framework
To ensure seamless action, roles across departments have been clearly defined.
I4C (MHA) will serve as the central aggregator for complaints and maintain a secure NCII hash bank.
Department of Telecommunications (DoT) will work with internet service providers to block flagged URLs.
MeitY will monitor compliance and ensure coordinated action by the platforms and other government stakeholders.
Government Push for Online Safety
Officials say the SOP is designed to offer a victim-centric, uniform process to curb the spread of intimate images shared without consent and bolster enforcement of Rule 3(2)(b) of the IT Rules, 2021. The government maintains that the initiative will particularly help women regain control over their digital identities while strengthening privacy and dignity online.
