The Indian government keeps expanding its powers to arbitrarily take down or restrict access to content on the internet. But it has no coherent answer to a basic enforcement problem: unless the flagged content is deleted, anyone can bypass such measures with a VPN.

Sure, this is good for free speech and the freedom of expression. But if something is genuinely illegal, what happens when enforcement can be defeated by simply downloading a free VPN and routing through another country?

India does regulate VPN providers to an extent, but still lacks a clear policy for VPN-enabled circumvention of the law by users.

Any serious conversation about what such a policy could look like is difficult because the debate is increasingly divided between free-speech advocates who see any calls to regulate VPNs as government overreach, and those who enthusiastically support the government having sweeping powers to suppress dissent and muzzle citizens, political opponents, and civil society.

What this has done is that any conversation about regulating the internet and what all is passing off as “content” does not lead to any meaningful conclusions that can be implemented sustainably. Because any measure can be made redundant by using a VPN.

Surely, there must be a way to resolve this impasse with existing technology.