WhatsApp to HC: New privacy policy not put off

WhatsApp to HC: New privacy policy not put off

Abhinav.Garg@timesgroup.com

New Delhi:18.05.2021

Instant messaging platform WhatsApp on Monday told Delhi high court that the new privacy policy has not been deferred and came into affect from May 15th. It clarified before a bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and justice Jyoti Singh that the deadline for the policy to come into effect has not been extended, but accounts won’t be deleted immediately.

“We are still trying to persuade consumers but if they don’t accept slowly, slowly these accounts will be deleted. There is no universal deadline for this,” senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing the company, said.In response, the Centre maintained that the new privacy policy of WhatsApp violates the IT law and rules, and sought directions to the social media platform to keep status quo intact.

Appearing for Centre ASG Chetan Sharma, said that India has the largest number of users of WhatsApp in the world and there is an imminent need to maintain the status quo.

Govt awaiting reply from Facebook CEO

ASG Chetan Sharma said the government has written to Facebook CEO on the issue and a reply is awaited.

However both WhatsApp and its parent company Facebook opposed any stay. It stressed that the policy doesn’t violate Indian law saying that any move to delete accounts will be on a case to case basis but there is no time limit for the same.

The HC then posted the matter for detailed hearing on June 03. It is hearing a batch of petitions challenging the new privacy policy. It also issued notice to the Centre, Facebook and WhatsApp and sought their stand on one of the petitions by a lawyer who has claimed that the new policy violates users’ right to privacy under the Constitution.