Indian Army Issues New Guidelines on Social Media Use for Personnel: What's Allowed, What's Not

New Delhi: The Indian Army has issued a policy on the use of social media applications like Instagram and others, allowing personnel to access Instagram for "purposes of viewing and monitoring only", ANI

reported on Thursday. According to the army officials, personnel are advised not to share their comments or views while accessing various Apps.

Indian Army's New Social Media Guidelines - What's Allowed And What's Not

In view of the newly issued guidelines by the Indian Army, for Apps like -- Skype, WhatsApp, Telegram and Signal -- only exchange of unclassified information of a general nature/contents have been permitted.Contents to be exchanged only with known persons. Responsibility for correctly identifying the recipient lies with the user, ANI quoted officials as saying.

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"For Apps like YouTube, X (formerly Twitter), Quora and Instagram, only passive participation to obtain knowledge or information has been permitted. Uploading of user-generated content and messages etc is not permitted," they said.ALSO READ | What Akash-NG’s Successful Trials Mean for India’s Air Defence Shield - WATCHLinkedIn can be used only for uploading a resume for obtaining information on potential employees or employers, Army's new rules mentioned.

Why Indian Army Issued Social Media Guidelines

The new guidelines have been issued to every army unit and department, sources said.The objective of the new rules is to allow soldiers to view, monitor content being shared on social media but for their awareness and information purpose only.ALSO READ | Big Air Defence Move! India in 'Advance Stage' to Buy Over 800 Kamikaze Drones - What Are They

Through this, the soldiers will be able to track what’s being shared and report content that may be fake, controversial or misleading to their senior officers.The new rules have been placed after several incidents of soldiers falling victim to honey traps set by foreign agencies that led to the leaking of sensitive information, risking national security have surfaced, even though the sharing of information is unintentional.