Terming its new privacy policy unilateral, unfair and unacceptable, the ministry of electronics and details technologies (MeitY) on Tuesday asked WhatsApp to withdraw it and reconsider its method to details privacy, freedom of decision and information safety.
In a strongly-worded letter to CEO Will Cathcart, the ministry has also sought a detailed details about its information sharing protocols and organization practices. MeitY has also raised objections to the differential therapy accorded by WhatsApp to its customers in India compared with these in the European Union.
WhatsApp’s new privacy policy was to be implemented from February 8 but has been place on hold till May 15 due to user backlash the policy aims to share industrial user information with parent Facebook.
In its letter, MeitY has stated the terms of service and the proposed privacy policy are an ‘all-or-nothing’ method, which take away any meaningful decision from Indian customers. The ministry has also sought detailed answers to a set of 14 inquiries.
The letter mentions that WhatsApp has notified its users’ that it will gather a vast quantity of very invasive and granular metadata from their chats with organization accounts and share it with other Facebook firms.
“With this, any meaningful distinction between WhatsApp and Facebook companies will cease to exist. Given the huge user base that WhatsApp and Facebook have in India, the consolidation of this sensitive information also exposes a very large segment of Indian citizens to greater security risks and vulnerabilities creating a honeypot of information,” MeitY noted.
The government is especially concerned about the lack of solutions for Indian customers of WhatsApp as the new policy does not provide a mechanism for them to opt place. “This approach leverages the social significance of WhatsApp to force users into a bargain, which may infringe on their interests in relation to informational privacy and information security,” the ministry has stated.
Further, the ministry has stated Parliament is currently examining the Personal Data Protection Bill and producing such a momentous alter for Indian customers at this time puts the cart prior to the horse. Since the Bill strongly follows the principle of “purpose limitation”, these modifications could lead to substantial implementational challenges for WhatsApp need to the Bill come to be an Act.
Raising objections against differential and discriminatory therapy meted out to Indian customers, the ministry stated it owes a sovereign duty to its citizens to guarantee their interests are not compromised. The discriminatory therapy of Indian customers shows lack of respect for the rights and interests of Indian citizens, who type 1 of the biggest user base for WhatsApp.
The ministry has sought specifics about precise categories of information that WhatsApp collects from Indian customers. The app has been asked about permissions and user consent sought and the utility of each and every of these with respect to the functioning and distinct service supplied. WhatsApp has been asked to provide specifics about the distinction amongst its privacy policies in India and other nations. Also, the government desires to know if WhatsApp conducts profiling of Indian customers on the basis of their usage of application and the nature of profiling performed. “Does WhatsApp share data with any other app or business unit of the same company or associated companies,” the ministry has asked. The government has sought specifics about the server exactly where information of Indians is hosted and transmitted.
MeitY has also sought to know regardless of whether the app captures details about the other apps operating on the mobile device of the customers and regardless of whether WhatsApp has supplied any access to a third party to a user’s individual information.