A bank run by Chief Justice SA Bobde, while seeking a response from the Center, WhatsApp and Facebook, said it would have to intervene to protect people’s privacy.
On Monday, the Supreme Court strongly opposed the encrypted messaging app WhatsApp, saying it may be a $ 2 trillion or $ 3 trillion company, but “people value their privacy more than their money.”
The higher court noted: “People are very concerned about the loss of privacy. It is our duty to protect people’s privacy ”. He asked the firm to commit under oath that the private data of the users is not shared with any third party and that it will comply with the country’s data protection law when it is in force.
A bank run by Chief Justice SA Bobde, while seeking a response from the Center, WhatsApp and Facebook, said it would have to intervene to protect people’s privacy.
The court’s observation came in an allegation against WhatsApp’s new privacy policy for Indian users, in which it plans to share commercial user data with its parent company Facebook. This policy would be implemented from February 8, but due to user reaction, it was suspended until May 15.
The government has also written to WhatsApp, calling its new privacy policy a unilateral, unfair, and unacceptable change, and asked it to withdraw it. It has also sought detailed information on its data exchange protocols and business practices, while raising objections regarding the differential treatment accorded by the company to its users in India compared to those in the European Union.
The court told lead attorneys Kapil Sibal, Arvind Datar, and Mukul Rohatgi, the attorneys featured on WhatsApp, that it had read in the media that the entire circuit to whom messages are forwarded, including location, is revealed to Facebook / WhatsApp. .
Sibal denied any private confidential data being shared and noted that the matter was pending before the Delhi High Court. Lead attorney Shyam Divan argued that Indian users are being treated unfairly as WhatsApp has a different privacy regime for European users. He argued that WhatsApp’s privacy policy cannot be different for India and added that the government should order WhatsApp not to implement the new privacy policy that differentiates between Indians and Europeans in terms of privacy standards.
Attorney General Tushar Mehta told the court that “regardless of whether there is a law or not, the right to privacy is part of fundamental rights. They (WhatsApp) must protect the right and must not share data ”.
Sibal told the court that Europe had a special law on privacy and WhatsApp would do the same if India had a similar statute.
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