India: Media, Telecoms, IT, Entertainment

India’s data protection landscape is undergoing its most significant shift in over a decade. The Information Technology (Reasonable Security Practices and Procedures and Sensitive Personal Data or Information) Rules, 2011 (“SPDI Rules”), have long formed the core of personal data protection obligations under the Information Technology Act, 2000 (“IT Act“) for body corporates handling sensitive personal data or information.

India's semiconductor ambitions are gaining global attention as the country moves beyond fabrication facilities to build an integrated ecosystem spanning raw materials, equipment manufacturing, chip design, and advanced packaging. With strategic partnerships already underway and a target to produce 3nm semiconductors by 2032, India faces the challenge of reducing its 90% import dependence while developing domestic capabilities across the entire value chain.

Cybersecurity regulation in India has, until now, largely spoken to the entity that suffers the breach. The 2022 CERT-In Directions issued under Section 70B of the Information Technology Act, 2000 fixed a six-hour reporting clock on the organisation that detects an incident. The new Guidelines flip the lens onto the entity upstream of that breach, the OEM or technology provider that built the product in the first place. For the first time, vendors supplying software, firmware, cloud platforms, or APIs into India carry direct, time-bound, and independently verifiable obligations of their own and not obligations that are merely passed through a customer contract, but obligations CERT-In itself may enforce.

Nearly half a century after the 1975-77 Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi's government - a period that witnessed wholesale press censorship and the suspension of fundamental rights - India finds itself confronting a new, more sophisticated threat to media freedom.

As India transitions from the successful Production Linked Incentive (PLI) era into a more mature industrial phase, the Union Cabinet has approved the Mobile Phone Manufacturing Scheme (MPMS).

On 31 July 1995, India heard its first mobile ring, when the then Union Minister of Communications spoke from Delhi to the then Chief Minister of West Bengal in Kolkata. For most of the two decades that followed, India consumed mobile phones without making them. In 2014, the country had only two mobile phone manufacturing units and was approximately 78% import dependent, with roughly 75% of domestic demand in 2014-15 being met through imports. Today, India has over 300 mobile manufacturing units and imports account for about 0.02% of domestic demand.

The internet is the most dynamic tool of the 21st century, with a myriad of applications that have drastically increased the flow of information across the globe. It has become the epicenter of human existence and a catalyst for development to an unprecedented extent. While its convenient and borderless nature has enhanced global connectivity, it has simultaneously given rise to modern-day quandaries.

The 2026 FIFA World Cup, co-hosted by the United States, Canada, and Mexico, is scheduled to be held from June 11 to July 19, 2026, and with the advent of any major sporting event, the online piracy sites also mushroom around the same time.

The Supreme Court has clarified the service tax treatment of marketing and promotion expenditure incurred by a broadcaster on commercially exploiting acquired music and song video rights. The Court upheld the CESTAT’s view that such expenditure does not represent consideration for any taxable service to the film producers, since the broadcaster promoted the rights for its own benefit as assignee and therefore no taxable service relationship existed.

The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (“FSSAI”) has, over the course of late May 2025, taken two connected regulatory steps aimed at curbing misleading claims on packaged food labels. First, FSSAI issued a formal advisory to all Food Business Operators (“FBOs”) directing them to discontinue the use of the term “100%” on food labels, packaging, and promotional material. Second, and consistent with the concerns underlying that advisory, FSSAI issued a detailed notice to a confectionery company in India, flagging specific instances of non-compliant labelling and misleading claims across several of its product lines.

Across India, educational institutions and businesses that deal with minors have made it a routine practice to photograph children celebrating achievements, post their names and images on social media, websites, and marketing material, share performance data with third parties, and collect biometric or health-related data — all without obtaining verifiable parental consent. These photographs and videos are posted without the child or parent having any meaningful opportunity to review, restrict, or object.

The commercial exploitation of fictional characters is hardly new. Recognisable characters from film and television sell everything from toys and apparel to cars and financial services. But when does borrowing a character for an advertisement cross the line from creative reference into infringement?