WhatsApp Policy Tweak: Government Tells Chat App To Withdraw 'Discriminatory' Policy For Indian Users

The ministry has raised several questions and pointed out that sharing of some data, including business data, generated with WhatsApp with Facebook will further weaken the information security of the users.

In a latest scrutiny on social media app Whatsapp, the Ministry of information and Technology (MEITY) has written a letter to the chat app asking it to keep Indian users out of the new privacy policy and the new terms and conditions that users have to accept to use the app.

What’s the new policy?

Under the new WhatsApp policy, it would allow the app to share more usage data with Facebook, which is its parent company, as well as help it rollout an e-commerce component within the app. The letter from the ministry has been sent to WhatsApp CEO Will Cathcart.

The new policy has not gone down well with the users. Millions of users have moved to competing platforms such as Signal and Telegram after the new policy started appearing in WhatsApp as a pop-up, asking users to accept it or else lose access to WhatsApp by the end of February.  After the agitation, the company has pushed the implementation of its new policy by May 15. The new policy has also been challenged in the Delhi High Court.

What are the objections raised?

In its letter to WhatsApp, MEITY has raised several questions and objections. It points out that sharing of some data — including business data — generated with WhatsApp with Facebook will further weaken the information security of the users.

The government also raised objection to the fact that WhatsApp has different policies for users across the world. In the EU the same policy that WhatsApp is forcing on India users will not be implemented. The ministry has raised 14 questions from WhatsApp on how user data is utilised and what sort of privacy protections users get.