New Delhi: The Press Information Bureau’s (PIB) fact checking unit acted against more than 28,000 instances involving fake news on digital platforms between November 2020 and June 2023, information and broadcasting (I&B) minister Anurag Thakur said on July 20 while answering an unstarred question in the Rajya Sabha, Newslaundry reported.According to the I&B ministry’s data, the highest number of posts containing fake news were reported during the second Covid-19 wave and the fact checking body took action against more than 5,000 posts in April 2021 and nearly 800 posts in May that year, the report said.Thakur, while responding to a different unstarred question from TMC leader Derek O’Brien, said that the BJP government has blocked public access to 635 URLs, including 10 websites and five applications, since December 2021 under the IT Rules, 2021. It did not provide details of these URLs, Newslaundry reported.Also read: Out of Nearly 1.2 Lakh Queries in 3 Years, PIB’s Fact-Check Unit Acted on 1,223The ministry’s statement said the PIB undertakes a “rigorous process” of fact-checking involving “multiple layers of cross-checking”, the Newslaundry report said.Earlier this year, the PIB had revealed that of the 1.2 lakh requests it had received for fact checking information in the last three years, it had only acted upon 1,223 of them – a modest 1% action rate, The Wire had reported.The PIB in its response also admitted that this fact-check unit is currently operating without any statutory basis or institutional mechanisms and the new fact-check units to be set up under the notified IT Amendment Rules, 2023, have not been established yet.Also read: PIB Fact-Check Unit Claims Our Article on Its Work Is ‘Misleading’. Five Reasons Why It Is Wrong.The Bombay high court had called these amendments “excessive” while hearing pleas challenging the new rules. The amendments empower the government to take action against “fake news” about it on social media through a fact check unit. The court had asked who will fact-check the fact checking units, adding that one cannot “bring a hammer to kill an ant.”The amended IT Rules have been under fire from several quarters for curbing free speech and amounting to censorship.