Meta / Reuters-Yonhap

Meta has apologized for temporarily blocking a Facebook post by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

According to Reuters on the 5th (local time), Joel Kaplan, Meta's global head of public policy, said in a statement that day that on behalf of Meta, he apologized to India's Minister of Electronics and Information Technology for the error that led to the blocking of PM Modi's Facebook post.

The incident traces back to last month. In late July, PM Modi uploaded a video to Facebook and Instagram discussing the leak of medical school exam papers, but the video was temporarily blocked on Facebook. India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology subsequently summoned Meta executives to explain the situation. Meta explained at the time that the post had been unintentionally blocked due to an operational error.

Following the incident, police in the southern city of Hyderabad booked Arun Srinivas, head of Meta's India operations, over videos posted to Facebook that were described as depicting PM Modi in an "insulting manner."

The videos in question spread at a time when Modi was facing the largest youth-led protests in more than a decade. In India, revelations that national exam questions had been leaked sparked widespread anger among young people, led by groups including the Cockroach People's Party (CJP), putting Modi on the political defensive and ultimately leading to the resignation of the education minister.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg also separately apologized to the Indian government that same day, according to reports. Local outlets including financial news site Moneycontrol reported that during a meeting between Meta executives and Indian government officials, Zuckerberg apologized for operational issues including child sexual exploitation material and deepfake content.

The child sexual exploitation content issue first emerged last month. The BBC reported, citing a senior official at the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, that the Indian government had ordered Meta last month to remove ads and content promoting child sexual exploitation material on Instagram. Meta told the BBC at the time that it applies a zero-tolerance policy toward such content and continues to strengthen its detection systems.

                                                                                                              Jeong Ri-na