Delhi HC begins hearing plea on FB, WhatsApp in order of refusing with CCI privacy Policy

WhatsApp told the Delhi High Court that the messaging app will not enforce its privacy policies until the Personal Data Protection Bill comes into force.

Delhi HC started a hearing on the plea of FB, WhatsApp against the order refusing to interfere with the CCI probe on Privacy Policy.

Senior Advocate Harish Salve on Friday told Delhi High Court that WhatsApp will not enforce its privacy policies until the Personal Data Protection Bill comes into force. Salve, appearing on behalf of WhatsApp and Facebook, said the new privacy policy is on hold.

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Whatsapp also clarified before the bench of Chief justice DN Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh that it would not limit the functionality for users who are not opting for a new privacy policy in the meantime

During the time of the hearing, Harish Salve said that “The government has asked to shut down the policy. We have said we will not enforce it till the Data Protection Bill is passed. That is open-ended because we don’t know when the Bill is going to come out.”

Harish Salve further told the Delhi High Court: “We have said we will not do this for a while. Suppose the Bill allows me to do it, we will have completely different ramifications.”

Harish Salve said, “We voluntarily agreed to put it on hold… we will not compel people to accept.”

Harish Salve in the hearing said, “The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology feels WhatsApp’s privacy policy is against Information Technology which is Reasonable Security Practices and Procedures and Sensitive Personal Data or Information Rules 2011.”

Salve said that Whatsapp would nonetheless continue to display the update to its users.

“We replied to MeitY’s notice seeking a response, saying that WhatsApp will not limit functionality for some time and continue to show users the update,” Harish Salve said.

Salve added, “We will maintain this approach until the Data Protection Bill comes into force. We have voluntarily agreed to put the update on hold till then.”

Harish Salve further pointed out the issue that the “challenge to the privacy policy and challenge to CCI order for probe are different…80 percent to 90 percent is related to the privacy policy challenge”.

The Privacy Policy is still on hold until the new data protection law comes under force.