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Supreme Court On WhatsApp and Meta: The Supreme Court on Tuesday issued a strong warning to WhatsApp and its parent company, Meta, over concerns related to user data sharing. The apex court made it clear that citizens’ right to privacy cannot be compromised in the name of technology or business interests.
A bench led by Chief Justice Surya Kant, along with Justice Joymalya Bagchi, strongly reprimanded the US-based company, saying, “You cannot play with privacy… we will not allow you to share even a single digit of our data.” The court added that it would not tolerate the exploitation of Indian users.
The hearing was related to WhatsApp’s 2021 “take it or leave it” privacy policy and the company law tribunal’s decision to uphold the Competition Commission of India’s Rs 213 crore fine on the company.
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The court also directed Meta to file an affidavit clearly stating that it will not share WhatsApp user data for advertising purposes. It warned that failure to do so could lead to the dismissal of Meta’s case. However, there was also a cross-appeal by the CCI about sharing of user data for advertising purposes, which the tribunal allowed after ruling there was no ‘abuse of power’ by the company.
Adding further, the Supreme Court on Tuesday described the practice as a “mockery of constitutionalism” and questioned how user consent could be considered valid when acceptance of the policy was enforced on a “take it or leave it” basis. Justice Joymalya Bagchi said the issue against the companies was that the consent obtained was “manufactured consent.”
