Sections 67 to 67C IT Act: Obscenity, Sexual Content and CSAM

Sections 67 to 67B form a three-step ladder of content offences: obscene material, sexually explicit material, and material involving children, each step carrying graver punishment and, at the top, the strictest liability the Act knows short of terrorism. Section 67C stands beside them, obliging intermediaries to preserve the records that make these prosecutions possible. This note covers the ladder step by step: the tests of obscenity and the cases that shaped them, the aggravated offence and its role against intimate image abuse and deepfakes, the five limbs of the children's provision and its POCSO interface, and the retention duty.

1. A Ladder with Three Rungs

The law grades sexual content the way criminal law grades violence. What offends public decency (obscenity) is the first rung; what depicts explicit sexual acts is the second, punished harder; and anything that touches a child is the top rung, where even looking becomes criminal. Climbing the ladder, the defences narrow: art and literature can save the first rung, rarely the second, and nothing bona fide about the third except genuine science, justice and heritage uses.

Figure 1: The three content offences and their punishments

2. Section 67: Obscene Material in Electronic Form

• Publishing and transmitting. Publishing makes the material available; transmitting sends it electronically to another. Uploading, posting, forwarding on a messaging group and hosting can each qualify, and 'causes to be published or transmitted' catches the person behind the uploader.
• Obscenity: the three descriptions. Lascivious; appealing to the prurient interest (an excessive, unhealthy interest in sex); or tending to deprave and corrupt those likely, in the circumstances, to read, see or hear it. The audience matters: material aimed at children is judged by its effect on them.
• Electronic and social media obscenity. The section is the electronic counterpart of the general obscenity offence, and covers posts, reels, group forwards and websites; for electronic content it is the special law, so prosecution goes under s.67, not the general provision alone (Sharat Babu Digumarti)
• Against the BNS. s.294 BNS punishes obscene books, objects and displays 'including in electronic form' with up to 2 years and ₹5,000 on first conviction; s.67 is the graver, medium-specific offence and holds the field for electronic publication.

Figure 2: From Hicklin to community standards

Figure 3: The cases that shaped Section 67

3. Section 67A: Sexually Explicit Material

• The offence. Publishing or transmitting, or causing the publication or transmission of, material containing a sexually explicit act or conduct: first conviction up to five years and fine up to ₹10 lakh; second, up to seven years and the same fine. Being punishable above three years, it is non-bailable.
• Section 67 vs Section 67A. s.67 asks whether the material is obscene by community standards; s.67A asks the narrower factual question whether it contains sexually explicit acts. Explicit material will usually satisfy both, and s.67A then supplies the graver charge; suggestive but non-explicit content stays under s.67 alone.
• The exception. The proviso common to ss.67 and 67A saves bona fide publication for the public good in the interest of science, literature, art or learning, and material kept or used for religious purposes, which protects medical literature and genuine art.
• Consent is no defence to publication. The persons shown may have consented to the act; publication is a distinct wrong, which is where intimate image abuse enters.

Non-consensual intimate images, revenge porn and deepfakes

Figure 4: The legal framework for intimate image abuse

• Revenge porn: the applicable framework. Publishing a former partner's intimate images engages s.66E (the privacy capture and publication offence), s.67 and usually s.67A (the content offences), with s.77 BNS voyeurism where the victim is a woman, and intimidation or defamation where the images are used to threaten or shame. Convictions have proceeded on exactly this stack (the Animesh Boxi case in West Bengal being the early example)
• The takedown route. Under the IT Rules, 2021, intermediaries must remove content exposing private areas or shown in a sexual act, on complaint, within 24 hours (Rule 3(2)(b)); the February 2026 amendment tightens action on intimate imagery to two hours. The Delhi High Court in X v. Union of India pressed for effective, re-upload-proof removal.
• Deepfake sexual content. Synthetic imagery is caught by the same content offences, ss.67 and 67A, with s.66E where a real person's identifiable body or face is used, s.66D where the fake personates, and defamation. The 2026 amendments add labelling and provenance duties for synthetically generated content (see Topic 21)

4. Section 67B: Child Sexual Abuse Material

Figure 5: The five limbs of Section 67B

• Publishing and the full chain. Clause (a) covers publishing or transmitting material depicting children in sexually explicit acts; clause (b) then criminalises the whole chain around it: creating text or digital images, collecting, seeking, browsing, downloading, advertising, promoting, exchanging or distributing, so even seeking out and viewing such material is an offence.
• Creating digital images of children. Clause (b)'s 'creates text or digital images' reaches wholly computer-generated or virtual child sexual material and written material, no real child need have been abused for the offence.
• Grooming and facilitation. Clause (c) punishes cultivating, enticing or inducing children into online relationships for sexually explicit acts, the online grooming offence; clause (d) punishes facilitating online child abuse, catching group administrators, link-sharers and platforms run for the purpose.
• Recording. Clause (e) punishes recording abuse of children, one's own or others', in electronic form.
• Punishment and terms. First conviction up to five years, subsequent up to seven, each with fine up to ₹10 lakh; non-bailable. 'Children' means persons under 18. The proviso saves bona fide heritage, scientific, educational and justice-related uses.
• Cyberstalking of children. Persistent online pursuit of a child pairs clause (c) with POCSO's sexual harassment offence (s.11) and stalking under s.78 BNS where the victim is a girl.

Figure 6: Section 67B and the POCSO Act

• Section 67B vs POCSO. POCSO ss.13 to 15 punish using a child for pornographic purposes and storage or possession; s.67B governs the electronic material and online conduct. Both apply to online CSAM, and by s.42 POCSO the offender suffers the punishment greater in degree; POCSO's Special Courts and child-friendly procedure govern trial.

5. Section 67C: Preservation and Retention by Intermediaries

Figure 7: The retention duty and its sanction

• The duty. Intermediaries must preserve and retain such information as the Central Government prescribes, in the prescribed manner and format and for the prescribed duration. The IT Rules, 2021 and the CERT-In Directions supply working retention periods, registration data for 180 days after withdrawal and logs for 180 days among them.
• Section 67C and investigation. The duty exists for the sections around it: obscenity, CSAM and fraud prosecutions die without preserved logs, subscriber records and content, and interception and monitoring under ss.69 to 69B presume the data still exists.
• Failure to preserve. Intentional or knowing contravention was an offence (up to three years and fine); since 30 November 2023 it is a civil penalty of up to ₹25 lakh, adjudicated under s.46 (see Topic 40)

6. Quick Revision and Memory Aids

• 'Obscene, explicit, children: the ladder'. ss.67, 67A, 67B.
• '3-5, 5-7, 5-7'. The first and repeat punishments on each rung.
• 'Community standards, whole work, ordinary person'. The obscenity test after Aveek Sarkar.
• 'Vulgar is not obscene'. Apoorva Arora.
• 'Publish, chain, groom, facilitate, record'. The five limbs of s.67B.
• 'Even a look is possession'. Just Rights for Children Alliance on CSAM.
• '67C keeps the evidence alive'. The retention duty.

7. Frequently Asked Questions

What is the test of obscenity under Section 67?

The community standards test from Aveek Sarkar (2014): whether the material, taken as a whole and judged by contemporary community standards through the eyes of an ordinary reasonable person, is lascivious, appeals to the prurient interest or tends to deprave and corrupt its likely audience. Vulgarity or profanity alone is not obscenity (Apoorva Arora, 2024).

8. Related Topics

• Topic 60: Sections 66B to 66F. The other specific offences of 2008.
• Topic 21: IT Act and Deepfakes. Synthetic content and the 2026 rules.