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Data sharing: SC notice to WhatsApp, Facebook
The Supreme Court on Monday issued notices to the Union government, WhatsApp, Facebook and TRAI on a plea that sought government regulation of the online messaging services. Replies to the notices issued on Monday have to be filed in two weeks, after which further hearing will take place.
Plea seeks government regulation of the online messaging services
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday issued notices to the Union government, WhatsApp, Facebook and TRAI on a plea that sought government regulation of the online messaging services. Replies to the notices issued on Monday have to be filed in two weeks, after which further hearing will take place.
The Delhi HC had earlier denied any relief and refuse to interfere with the policy of WhatsApp and Facebook.
Responding to the plea of two law students who challenged the Delhi High Court order upholding the company's 2016 polity to share user information with Facebook, the bench headed by Chief Justice J S Khehar, said that it would hear the argument at length during the summer holidays.
Earlier, the bench observed that if someone did not like it, "...can choose to walk out (of WhatsApp) to protect your privacy.
Initially, the Chief Justice was reluctant to concede the plea commenting "what is disturbing here is you want to continue using this private service and at the same time want to protect your privacy... You can choose not avail of it....WhatsApp... you walk out of it.”
Senior counsel Harish Salve said WhatsApp, an instant messaging and call service with 155 million users, had become like a public utility service like telephone calls.
The bench intervened at this juncture to say "you pay for your telephone calls. You get your privacy. Here you don't pay. This is a private service." Salve raised to counter it to claim that even telephone calls have become free.
"The Government of India should protect my rights under Article 19 (freedom of speech and expression). The Telecom Regulatory of India (TRAI) says that interception of calls without government's order is an illegality... Here, it is not doing anything," Salve brought to the notice of the court.
The students had argued that the new policy would result in changing the most valuable feature of WhatsApp — privacy of details and data of its users. They had demanded an option of “do not share” for users who did not wish to share information with Facebook.
Chief Justice Khehar asked Harish Salve to argue the case himself while seeking the assistance of Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi.
The High Court had late last year upheld WhatsApp new privacy policy on sharing of users’ information with Facebook effective from September 25 while directing the instant messaging app to “delete completely” from its serverinformation/data/details of all users who choose to delete their account.
A High Court bench headed by Chief Justice G Rohini had also directed that “so far as users who opt to remain on WhatsApp are concerned, their existing information/ data/ details up to September 25, 2016, shall not be shared with Facebook or any group companies.”
Declining to tell WhatsApp to give an option of “do not share’’ to its users, the bench said such users can any time delete their accounts.
It, however, directed the Centre and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India to “consider issues regarding functions of Internet Messaging Applications like WhatsApp and take an appropriate decision at the earliest as to whether it is feasible to bring the same under a statutory regulatory framework”.
