New Delhi, Oct. 16 -- The Supreme Court on Thursday agreed to issue orders on preventive steps to be taken by the Centre and other stakeholders against child sexual exploitative and abuse material (CSEAM) online, citing the seriousness of the matter. The order was passed after the ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY) submitted a draft Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to the court. "As part of the future preventive action required to be taken with respect to dissemination of CSEAM content, MeitY has drafted an SOP for the intermediaries for prevention, direction, removal and reporting of CSEAM content to a government portal (Sahyog)," the order stated. The bench said, "This is a very serious matter. We want the Union government to take it seriously. We will pass an order. We will suggest you some things that will be helpful for you." The court posted the matter after a month to allow the Centre come up with further developments on preventing CSEAM online. The Centre said in February this year, the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 were amended to incorporate specific due diligence obligations for preventing and reporting CSEAM content on their platforms....