Policy and regulations
A Facebook like is enough to make you an insider-trading culprit
Sebi has invested crores of rupees in modern surveillance tools. Why does it then rely on such crude ‘evidence’ to establish wrongdoing?
There is big data — the kind Cambridge Analytica allegedly mined to influence citizen choices.Then there is small data — the ones you see in newspaper articles and advertising campaigns.Finally, there is the Facebook Like. According to the Securities Exchange Board of India (Sebi), liking a person’s Facebook post is enough to establish that you have inside information about
of its authority and the need to conduct surveillance on social media under securities laws — that too at an interim stage.“Currently, such orders operate in a legal and ethical vacuum, and it is necessary that Sebi or appellate authorities issue guidance on that,” says Agrawal. “Unless such guidelines are issued, this order is a worrisome precedent for Indian democracy.”
