Delhi Police on Wednesday has registered an FIR against Meta over circulation of Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse Material (CSEAM) on its platforms, said National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) member Priyank Kanoongo.
Priyank Kanoongo posted on X, "Acting on our directions, Delhi Police has registered an FIR regarding the availability of Child Sexual Exploitative and Abuse Material (CSEAM) on platforms operated by @MetaIndia."
The development comes less than a month after Meta announced new AI tools to identify advertisements that appear innocuous but may covertly direct users to child sexual abuse material hosted outside its platforms.
Meta on October 9 said it had found that predators were increasingly using advertising to evade detection, with seemingly harmless ads being used to funnel users to illegal content on external websites.
After identifying such activity, Meta said it had expanded its investigation beyond the ads initially flagged, disabled the accounts involved and blocked the links leading to off-platform content.
Meta had acted on 5.3 million pieces of child sexual exploitation content in the first half of 2026, with more than 98 per cent of the material detected proactively before it was reported.
Earlier, on September 16, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) summoned the Managing Director and Head of Meta India in connection with its inquiry into CSEAM advertisements.
The Commission has once again summoned the MD and Head of Meta India for the hearing scheduled as part of the ongoing inquiry, as per sources.
With the persistent follow up of NCPCR in the matter, the platform revised its policy on reporting cases of child sexual abuse material.
Speaking on the matter the Meta spokesperson said that the platform protecting children is a priority for the platform and they are committed to hold the perpetrators of these crimes responsible.
The spokesperson also added, "To collectively strengthen our efforts to combat this harm, Meta will now report child safety matters directly to the Cybercrime portal managed by the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (14C).”
(With inputs from ANI)