The Supreme Court of India has issued notices to central government,
Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), WhatsApp, and Facebook
over a plea seeking privacy on data.
The petition was filed by two law students against the WhatsApp's
proposal to start sharing some of the user data with the parent company,
Facebook.
The Delhi High Court had earlier denied the petition and refused to
interfere with matter. However, the Apex court has directed the
companies to reply to the notices within two weeks.
"What is disturbing here is you want to continue using this private
service and at the same time want to protect your privacy... You can
choose not avail of it [WhatsApp], you walk out of it,” Chief Justice of
India J.S. Khehar said.
According to the petitioner, there are 157 million users on WhatsApp and Facebook.
It's not that Facebook and WhatsApp are facing privacy issue in India
only, the even European Union has raised questions about Facebook's
privacy policy.
Last month the European Union Commissioner, Margrethe Vestager, had
said that "Facebook was misleading it about WhatsApp.Companies are
obliged to give the Commission accurate information during merger
investigations... In this specific case, the Commission's preliminary
view is that Facebook gave us incorrect or misleading information during
the investigation into its acquisition of WhatsApp. Facebook now has
the opportunity to respond."
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