Doxxing: When Your Private Life Goes Public

Doxxing is the sharing of someone’s private information online without their permission. This can include phone numbers, home addresses, identification documents, and even personal photos. Doxxing can lead to harassment, humiliation, and even real-world threats.

No Specific Law in India

While there’s no direct law against doxxing in India. Existing laws can be used to address specific aspects of it. These include voyeurism (Section 354C IPC and IT Act), sharing sexually explicit content (The IT Act) and obscene content (Section 292 IPC), defamation (Section 499 IPC), and online stalking (Section 354D IPC).

What to Do If You’re Doxxed

• Document the Evidence, collect screenshots and other proof of the doxxing.
• File a complaint with the police, cybercrime officials, or the social media platform where the doxxing occurred.
• Social Media Response- Most platforms like Twitter have mechanisms to report doxxing. Use those options. In some cases, you may need to consider changing your contact information or temporarily locking down your accounts.

The DPDP Act and Doxxing

India’s new data privacy law, the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act, 2023, The Act protects individual data privacy. However, the court clarified that it doesn’t apply to information already public, including social media posts.