A PIL is seeking constitution of expert committee to examine engagement-maximising and addiction-causing design features

NEW DELHI: Delhi high court on Wednesday asked the Centre to clarify if it was contemplating a policy to regulate addiction-causing design features on social media platforms like infinite scroll and autoplay.The court said it would hear after three weeks a PIL seeking constitution of an expert committee to examine engagement-maximising and addiction-causing design features on social media platforms.On being asked by HC if the Centre was thinking of framing a policy on the issue, ASG Chetan Sharma said he did not have specific instructions on this.“You take instructions…and we will have the matter after three weeks.” During the hearing, Centre and certain social media platforms objected to maintainability of the petition in view of orders of SC and HCs which refused to entertain petitions on a similar issue.Petitioner Vikas Kathuria said issue is not what content platforms carry, but how they are designed to cause addiction through infinite scroll, autoplay, personalised feeds, notification systems and “likes”.