WhatsApp takes Indian government to court over new social media laws
WhatsApp and the Indian government’s recent tug-of-war have taken a different turn. The Facebook-owned company has now filed a legal complaint against the Indian government for ruling its new social media laws unconstitutional.
According to ReutersUnder the new laws, WhatsApp would have to break the end-to-end encryption on its platform in order to find recipients and authors of original messages if the authorities so request. According to WhatsApp, this is against data protection rights in India.
The laws announced in February, known as the Intermediary Guidelines and Code of Ethics for Digital Media, are an offer by the Indian government to make social media companies “more responsible and accountable”, according to India’s IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad. India’s new laws also regulate government cooperation in instructing them to remove content or help with Internet-related investigations. Among other things, companies must implement a system for responding to complaints.
This law affects not only WhatsApp but all other social media and messaging companies as well. That includes WhatsApp’s rivals Telegram and Signal.
WhatsApp is pushing back against the Indian government after announcing controversial changes to its own privacy policy. Indian government called its new policy “discriminatory, unfair and irresponsible” Reuters.
Even so, WhatsApp believes the Indian government’s new laws “could lead to real abuse,” it said Axios in a statement. The company is also “committed to protecting the privacy of people’s personal messages, and we will continue to do all we can under Indian law to do so.”
