MEITY Asks WhatsApp to Withdraw Changes in Privacy Policy

In order to deal with the controversial privacy update, India has asked WhatsApp to withdraw its new privacy policy, saying the Facebook-owned messaging platform’s proposed changes make invasive and precise inferences about users. The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) has asked WhatsApp to clarify issues related to its privacy and data transfer and sharing policies, and general business practices within seven days. In an email addressed to WhatsApp’s global head Will Cathcart on Monday, the ministry said the proposed policy changes will have a disproportionate impact on the Indian citizens.

India is WhatsApp’s largest user base, with over 400 million users. The government has sent a long list of questions to the company on the issue and has said that having a lenient update for Europe while being stringent in India is discriminatory for Indian users. It asked WhatsApp to answer 14 questions related to the proposed update.

WhatsApp deferred introducing the policy from February 8 to May 15 after facing backlash, saying the update does not change data sharing with Facebook with regard to personal conversations or other profile information. It said the policy changes only address business chats in the event a user converses with a company’s customer service platform through WhatsApp. However, concerns remain, and several users are still opting out of the service. “These changes enable WhatsApp, and other

The government has sent a long list of questions to the company on the issue and has said that having a lenient update for Europe while being stringent in India is discriminatory for Indian users

Facebook companies, to make invasive and precise inferences about users which may not be reasonably foreseen or expected by users in the ordinary course of accessing these services,” said the ministry.

The government is also against the ‘all-or-nothing approach’ of WhatsApp where it has asked the users to either accept the terms or be ready to log out of full bouquet of services. The ‘all-or-nothing’ approach takes away any meaningful choice from Indian users, the government is believed to have said in its communication. The government is concerned about the ‘differential treatment’ that WhatsApp has followed for Indian users whose update conditions are different to users in Europe where privacy rules are seen lenient. The ministry has sought details of WhatsApp’s services in India, details of permissions and consent required by different versions of the app (WhatsApp has personal and business versions), what is the nature of profiling of Indian citizens through WhatsApp, if they profile them, on which server is the data of Indian users transmitted and hosted, and whether there is a difference in the company’s privacy policy in India and other countries.

Speaking at an event earlier in the day on Tuesday, Electronics and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said, “Be it WhatsApp or any other digital platform, you are free to do business in India but do it in a manner without infringing upon the rights of Indians who operate, and sanctity of personal communication needs to be maintained”.