Indian users of Bing now are told "your country or region requires a strict Bing SafeSearch setting, which filters out results that might return adult content," according to the an investigation published in The Guardian.
Yahoo search and Yahoo-owned photo-sharing site Flickr also are blocking access to adult material by preventing Indian users from turning off the safe-search feature. The same restrictions are given to users in Singapore, Hong Kong and Korea.
The initiative in India to block traffic evidently is in response to changes to the country’s Information Technology Act of 2000, which bans porn.
Under the new law, ISPs and Internet café operators are obligated to exercise due diligence and disable access to any content which goes against the act. Failure to do so carries a three-year jail sentence and a fine about $11,000.
