The Supreme Court on Friday issued notice to the Centre and Twitter on a petition seeking a mechanism to screen hateful content and fake news being circulated via social media. A bench of Chief Justice SA Bobde and Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian also directed that the matter be tagged with similar pending petitions.

The petition, filed by BJP leader Vinit Goenka, also sought a crackdown on "anti-India" content in Twitter aimed at provoking violence in various parts of the country. It also said there were hundreds of fake Twitter handles and bogus Facebook accounts in the name of eminent people and high dignitaries.

"These fake accounts use real photographs of many big personalities. In such a situation, the common user trusts these Twitter handles and accepts these news reports as factually correct," the petition said.

The Supreme Court on Friday issued notice to the Centre and Twitter on a petition seeking a mechanism to screen hateful content and fake news being circulated via social media. A bench of Chief Justice SA Bobde and Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian also directed that the matter be tagged with similar pending petitions.

The petition, filed by BJP leader Vinit Goenka, also sought a crackdown on "anti-India" content in Twitter aimed at provoking violence in various parts of the country. It also said there were hundreds of fake Twitter handles and bogus Facebook accounts in the name of eminent people and high dignitaries.

"These fake accounts use real photographs of many big personalities. In such a situation, the common user trusts these Twitter handles and accepts these news reports as factually correct," the petition said.