Delhi: High court seeks response from Center on application filed against WhatsApp’s new privacy policy

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday sought a response from the Center on a public interest litigation challenging WhatsApp’s new privacy policy. A bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh issued notice to the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and WhatsApp on the petition and asked them to respond by March.

The petitioner gave this argument

Petitioners Seema Singh, Meghan Singh and Vikram Singh have argued that the new privacy policy indicates “flaws” in Indian data protection and privacy laws. He has requested the court to direct the ministry and WhatsApp to ensure that people using this messenger app have an option not to share their personal information with their parent company Facebook or its other companies.

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He has also requested to instruct the Ministry to make guidelines and regulations for protecting the privacy of citizens from all the apps and organizations operating in India. Additional Solicitor General Chetan Sharma, appearing for the ministry, told the bench that a similar case is pending before a single judge and there the government has said that it is looking into the issue and has also sought information from WhatsApp in this regard. .

The petitioners stated in their petition that WhatsApp has been changing its privacy policy from time to time and users have always been given the option of not accepting it but were not denied the use of the app. He said that but in the new policy which came on January 4, it has been made mandatory for Indian users to consider them otherwise they will not be able to use this app, whereas there is no such thing in relation to URP users.