WhatsApp faces trouble as CAIT files plea in Supreme Court to roll back new privacy policy

A plea has been filed in the Supreme Court of India on Saturday, seeking a direction to instant messaging application WhatsApp to roll back its recently-launched new privacy policy on the ground that it violates fundamental rights of citizens and can impact the country's security. 

The plea filed by the Confederation of All India Traders has also sought a direction to the Centre to intervene in the matter and frame guidelines to govern large technology-based companies such as WhatsApp Inc., Facebook Inc., and Facebook India Online Services Private Limited.

READ | WhatsApp Postpones New Privacy Update Plan After Row; Says 'working To Counter Confusion'

CAIT in its plea has contended that, "The respondent no.1 -- Union of India -- has granted permission to respondent nos 2 to 4 to run the WhatsApp application in India, but has failed to play the role of a guardian to protect the fundamental rights of citizens in as much as WhatsApp, which is rendering essential public services by enabling citizens to communicate, has recently imposed unconstitutional privacy conditions which are not only violative of the law but can impact the national security of the country."

READ | WhatsApp Issues Clarification Over New Privacy Policy; Says It's For Business Accounts

"Today, high government officials like ministers and members of Parliament, judges, senior bureaucrats, defense personnel, crores of traders and well-known businessmen and so on use WhatsApp for sharing confidential and personal information and the compromise in the privacy policy would result in serious repercussions even for the national security of India," the plea added. 

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WhatsApp postpones its planned privacy update

WhatsApp on Friday announced that it has postponed its new privacy update, which will give users more time to review the policy and accept the terms of the application. The decision to postpone the privacy update has been taken due to "misinformation causing concern" among people, as per the company. 

Meanwhile, other messaging platforms like Signal and Telegram saw a massive increase in downloads right after WhatsApp sought users' consent to its updated privacy policy that seeks to share some data with Facebook. 

READ | Government Of India Examining WhatsApp's User Policy Changes Amid Raging Privacy Debate

WhatsApp has been in a huge controversy after the application decided to send out a notification reportedly asking for permission to share data with Facebook. Nevertheless, the messenger app has clarified its move by sharing an official statement about its data-sharing clause in the updated Terms and Conditions.