#FactCheck- Edited Video Falsely Shows Aaj Tak Anchor Anjana Om Kashyap Apologizing

Introduction
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Meta Platforms is experiencing a long-term surge of lawsuits that not only question particular practices, but also the very design and governance of its platforms, across the United States and beyond. This range of privacy breaches to youth mental health damages and antitrust issues are all indicative of a new era of judicial, regulatory, and civil society scrutiny of the duties of big tech firms. The main question is no longer whether harmful content is placed on platforms, but to what extent they are actively creating harm-producing environments.
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From Content to Conduct: A Turning Point in Legal Strategy
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Over the years, Meta and other sites have depended on legal safeguards like the US Communications Decency Act, Section 230, which protects companies against liability due to user-created content. New ways of testing that protection are now being tried.

Recent incidents have shifted off the blame of particular content and has placed the emphasis on the design of the platform. Courts are becoming more receptive to consider whether the characteristics of infinite scroll, algorithmic amplification, and engagement-based ranking systems are contributing to quantifiable harm.

In March 2026, a California jury declared that Meta and Google were negligent in creating platforms that led to youth addiction and mental health problems. The jury decided that Meta and Google were to pay off a joint sum of 6 million dollars in damages, with 70 percent of the sum being charged on Meta. It is a bellwether case, which means that it is related to about 2,000 other pending cases by parents and school districts. This change is important as it avoids legal barriers. When the liability is linked to the design decisions instead of user-created content, accountability begins to shift. 
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The Youth Harm Cases: A Big Tobacco Moment
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Social media are becoming the subject of increased scrutiny by courts and regulators as products that have quantifiable psychological impacts. The most impactful group of lawsuits against Meta is, perhaps, the one concerning youth mental health.

A day prior to the California verdict, a New Mexico jury ordered Meta to pay $375 million in damages due to failure to safeguard young users against child predators on Instagram and Facebook, and found that the company had lied to consumers about the safety of its products and violated state consumer protection laws.

Similar arguments have been presented in other lawsuits filed by attorneys general in over 30 states, and the cases reflect previous regulatory turning points in other industries such as tobacco. The question that courts are not merely asking is whether there is harm or not. They are questioning whether businesses were aware of creating systems that capitalize on behavioral weaknesses. It has been reported in internal documents and accounts of former employees that Meta made a profit by intentionally turning its platforms into addictions to children, with algorithmic functions tailored to drive users into engagement loops, maximising time on platform to the detriment of wellbeing.

Meta has refuted these characterisations, claiming that teen mental health is multifaceted and cannot be blamed on an individual app. The companies have indicated that they will appeal the verdicts.
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Privacy and Data Misuse: An Ongoing Fault Line
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Platform design is not the only issue that Meta faces in legal matters. Cases centered on privacy have been a recurrent problem in the last ten years, and previous cases have claimed that Facebook monitored users even after they have logged out, scanned personal messages, and utilized personal data in a manner that was beyond user expectations. In more recent times, in April 2026, a class action suit was filed claiming that WhatsApp messages were accessed by Meta employees and third-party contractors, despite the long-standing end-to-end encryption guarantees of the platform.

These instances indicate a structural problem that is consistent. Consent mechanisms and privacy policies tend to be out of date with the reality of data use, and the gap between legal compliance and what users actually know or expect.
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Antitrust: A Win, But Not a Clean One
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One of the legal fronts was Meta all the way. In November 2025, a judge in the US District Court, James Boasberg, declared that Meta was not a social networking monopoly, finding that the FTC did not demonstrate that the acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp by the company were against the antitrust law. The decision has since been appealed by the FTC, which continues to argue that "Meta broke our antitrust laws by acquiring Instagram and WhatsApp, and that American consumers have been harmed by it.

The case also demonstrates a significant drawback of the antitrust law as a form of regulation of tech companies. By the time the trial occurred five years after the lawsuit was initiated, the social media market had evolved such that Tik Tok was a major competitor, undermining the market definition claims of the FTC. The structural issue of whether a few platforms are too powerful in the communication of the masses is not answered, although the legal claim in this instance might have been unsuccessful.
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Policy Takeaways: What This Means Going Forward
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The accumulating number of lawsuits against Meta provides a number of valuable lessons to policymakers.

1. Platform design has become a regulatory topic. Laws should go beyond content regulation and deal with the construction of systems. Engagement maximising features can also increase harm, and this trade-off must be governed explicitly.
2. Transparency should be mandatory and not discretionary. Privacy policies and disclosures on platforms are usually too complicated or ambiguous. Regulators might be required to make more transparent and standardised disclosures regarding the use of data and the operation of recommendation systems.
3. Section 230 safeguards are under reinterpretation. Courts are becoming open to restrict immunity in cases where the harm is associated with the conduct of the platform and not the content of the user. This would redefine the law of all digital platforms, and not only Meta.
4. Cross-border coordination is needed. Meta is an international company, yet the regulatory reaction is still divided. This will require more coordination among jurisdictions to guarantee uniform enforcement and to eliminate regulatory arbitrage.
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Conclusion
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The lawsuits of Meta are not single cases. They are a more general reconsideration of the regulation of digital platforms and the accountability of those responsible when design decisions have harm at scale. In the wider context of the technology ecosystem, the implications are structural. Courts are starting to question not only what is hosted on them, but how they work and why they are constructed in the manner they are.

The age of minimal responsibility is being supplanted by a more challenging requirement: that platforms should foresee, quantify, and alleviate the harms they produce. The result of these cases will not only decide the future of Meta in terms of legal matters. They will influence the regulations of the digital economy in the years to come.

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References
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1. https://www.npr.org/2026/03/25/nx-s1-5746125/meta-youtube-social-media-trial-verdict 
2. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/jury-finds-meta-and-youtube-liable-in-landmark-youth-addiction-case
3. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/meta-ftc-whatsapp-instagram/
4. https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/20/ftc-appeals-metaruling-antitrust-instagram-whatsapp.html‍
5. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/czjw0zgz9zyo

Executive Summary 

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A video featuring popular comedian Rajpal Yadav has recently gone viral on social media, claiming that he is currently lodged in Tihar Jail in connection with a loan default and cheque bounce case. In connection with this, another video showing Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan is being widely shared online. In the viral clip, Khan is purportedly seen saying that he would help Rajpal Yadav get out of jail and also offer him a role in his upcoming film. However, research by the CyberPeace found the viral video to be fake. The clip is a deepfake, in which the audio has been manipulated using artificial intelligence. In the original video, Shah Rukh Khan is speaking about his life and personal experiences. Although several prominent Bollywood personalities have expressed support for Rajpal Yadav, the claims made in the viral video are misleading.

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Claim

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An Instagram user named “ayubeditz” shared the viral video on February 11, 2026, with the caption: “Rajpal Yadav bhai, stay strong, we are all with you — Shah Rukh Khan.” The link to the post and its archived version are provided below.

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• https://www.instagram.com/p/DUnIwGyEfXO
• https://perma.cc/ZD6X-A5LF 

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Fact Check

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To verify the claim, we extracted key frames from the viral video and conducted a Google reverse image search. This led us to the original video uploaded on a YouTube channel titled “Locarno Film Festival” on August 11, 2024. According to the available information, Shah Rukh Khan was sharing insights about his life and career during a conversation with the festival’s Artistic Director, Giona A. Nazzaro. This raised strong suspicion that the viral video had been edited using AI.

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhjA7_R9MAE

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To further examine the authenticity of the audio, we analysed it using AI detection tools. The audio was first checked using Aurigin.ai, which indicated an 83 percent probability that the voice in the viral clip was AI-generated.

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Conclusion

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The CyberPeace’s research  confirmed that the claim associated with Shah Rukh Khan’s viral video is false. The video is a deepfake in which the audio has been altered using artificial intelligence. In the original footage, Khan was discussing his life and experiences, and he did not make any statement about helping Rajpal Yadav.

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Introduction 

The geographical world has physical boundaries, but the digital one has a different architecture and institutions are underprepared when it comes to addressing cybersecurity breaches. Cybercrime, which may lead to economic losses, privacy violations, national security threats and have psycho-social consequences,  is forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2029, reaching an estimated cost of at least 6.4 trillion U.S. dollars (Statista). As cyber threats become persistent and ubiquitous, they are becoming a critical governance challenge. Lawmakers around the world need to collaborate on addressing this emerging issue.

Cybersecurity Governance and its Structural Elements

Cybersecurity governance refers to the strategies, policies, laws, and institutional frameworks that guide national and international preparedness and responses to cyber threats to governments, private entities, and individuals. Effective cybersecurity governance ensures that digital risks are managed proactively while balancing security with fundamental rights like privacy and internet freedom. It includes, but is not limited to :

1. Policies and Legal Frameworks: Laws that define the scope of cybercrime, cybersecurity responsibilities, and mechanisms for data protection. Eg: India’s National Cybersecurity Policy (NCSP) of 2013, Information Technology Act, 2000, and Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, EU’s Cybersecurity Act (2019), Cyber Resilience Act (2024), Cyber Solidarity Act (2025), and NIS2 Directive (2022), South Africa’s Cyber Crimes Act (2021), etc.
2. Regulatory Bodies: Government agencies such as data protection authorities, cybersecurity task forces, and other sector-specific bodies. Eg: India’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), Europe’s  European Union Agency for Cybersecurity (ENISA), and others.
3. Public-Private Knowledge Sharing: The sharing of the private sector’s expertise and the government’s resources plays a crucial role in improving enforcement and securing critical infrastructure. This model of collaboration is followed in the EU, Japan, Turkey, and the USA. 
4. Research and Development: Apart from the technical, the cyber domain also includes military, politics, economy, law, culture, society, and other elements. Robust, multi-sectoral research is necessary for formulating international and regional frameworks on cybersecurity. 

Challenges to Cybersecurity Governance 

Governments face several challenges in securing cyberspace and protecting critical assets and individuals despite the growing focus on cybersecurity. This is because so far the focus has been on cybersecurity management, which, considering the scale of attacks in the recent past, is not enough. Stakeholders must start deliberating on the aspect of governance in cyberspace while ensuring that this process is multi-consultative. (Savaş & Karataş 2022). Prominent challenges which need to be addressed are: 

• Dynamic Threat Landscape: The threat landscape in cyberspace is ever-evolving.  Bad actors are constantly coming up with new ways to carry out attacks, using elements of surprise, adaptability, and asymmetry aided by AI and quantum computing. While cybersecurity measures help mitigate risks and minimize damage, they can’t always provide definitive solutions. E.g., the pace of malware development is much faster than that of legal norms, legislation, and security strategies for the protection of information technology (IT). (Efe and Bensghir 2019).
• Regulatory Fragmentation and Compliance Challenges: Different countries, industries, or jurisdictions may enforce varying or conflicting cybersecurity laws and standards, which are still evolving and require rapid upgrades. This makes it harder for businesses to comply with regulations, increases compliance costs, and jeopardizes the security posture of the organization. 
• Trans-National Enforcement Challenges: Cybercriminals operate across jurisdictions, making threat intelligence collection, incident response, evidence-gathering, and prosecution difficult.  Without cross-border agreements between law enforcement agencies and standardized compliance frameworks for organizations, bad actors have an advantage in getting away with attacks. 
• Balancing Security with Digital Rights: Striking a balance between cybersecurity laws and privacy concerns (e.g., surveillance laws vs. data protection) remains a profound challenge,  especially in areas of CSAM prevention and identifying terrorist activities. Without a system of checks and balances, it is difficult to prevent government overreach into domains like journalism, which are necessary for a healthy democracy, and Big Tech’s invasion of user privacy. 

The Road Ahead: Strengthening Cybersecurity Governance 

All domains of human life- economy, culture, politics, and society- occur in digital and cyber environments now. It follows naturally, that governance in the physical world translates into governance in cyberspace. It must be underpinned by features consistent with the principles of openness, transparency, participation, and accountability, while also protecting human rights. In cyberspace, the world is stateless and threats are rapidly evolving with innovations in modern computing. Thus, cybersecurity governance requires a global, multi-sectoral approach utilizing the rules of international law, to chart out problems, and solutions, and carry out detailed risk analyses. (Savaş & Karataş 2022). 

References

• https://www.statista.com/forecasts/1280009/cost-cybercrime-worldwide#statisticContainer
• https://link.springer.com/article/10.1365/s43439-021-00045-4#citeas 
• https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/cybersecurity-policies#ecl-inpage-cybersecurity-strategy 

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