Traders’ Body Moves SC Over WhatsApp’s New Privacy Policy, Says it Encroaches Upon People’s Rights

Traders’ body CAIT on Saturday filed a petition in the Supreme Court, making a plea to direct WhatsApp to withdraw its new privacy policy. The body issued a statement claiming that the new WhatsApp privacy policy encroaches upon various fundamental rights of the citizens. About the petition, the traders’ body said it “has also prayed that Union of India must frame guidelines to govern big technology companies like WhatsApp and frame policies which would protect the privacy of citizens and businesses”.

“The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) has today filed a petition in the Supreme Court with the prayer to direct WhatsApp to withdraw its new privacy policy, which is encroaching upon various fundamental rights of the citizens granted by Constitution of India,” the statement said.

Meanwhile, WhatsApp has announced delaying by three months the implementation of the new privacy policy that has faced a massive backlash with tens of millions of its users moving from the platform to rivals like Signal and Telegram.

The policy change was originally scheduled to come into effect on February 8, the Facebook-owned company said. It has clarified that the update does not affect data sharing with Facebook with regard to personal conversations or other profile information and only addresses business chats in the event a user converses with a company’s customer service platform through WhatsApp.

“The petition especially highlights the difference of approach in EU and India countries with respect to the privacy policy of WhatsApp and how the data of Indian users can be misused by such big tech companies,” CAIT said.