The Indian government has called WhatsApp out for the recently proposed changes in its privacy policy.?
In a new letter by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, WhatsApp has been instructed to withdraw the said changes in the interest of data privacy of Indian users.
In a letter reportedly penned by the ministry to WhatsApp CEO Will Cathcart, India has been highlighted to be one of the largest user base of WhatsApp globally. The ministry stated that such unilateral changes are not a fair measure in what is the chat app¡¯s one of the biggest markets in the world. "Any unilateral changes to the WhatsApp Terms of Service and Privacy would not be fair and acceptable," the letter read.
As quoted in a PTI report, the ministry stated that the proposed changes by the Facebook-owned chat app to the WhatsApp Terms of Service and Privacy Policy "raise grave concerns regarding the implications for the choice and autonomy of Indian citizens."
The letter stated that Indians should be properly respected, thus instructing WhatsApp to withdraw the unilateral changes. It further asked WhatsApp to reconsider its approach to ¡°information privacy, freedom of choice and data security,¡± as quoted in the report.
The backlash comes after WhatsApp announced that it has some changes in line with respect to its user data handling. In a clause, the company mentioned its plans on sharing some part of the data with its parent company, Facebook.
However, WhatsApp users in Europe are safe from this, as recent reports revealed that the company didn¡¯t include such a clause in its recent terms and services notification shared with them. The same was clarified by Niamh Sweeney, Director of Policy for WhatsApp, EMEA, over a series of tweets you can read here. This was in accordance with the strict GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) in place to protect European citizens from misuse of their private data.
Following global criticism on the selective practice, WhatsApp recently postponed the rollout of the new privacy policy from February to May. WhatsApp also confirmed that no accounts will be suspended on February 8, which was previously meant to be the case for those who do not accept the new terms of services.