WhatsApp India is fighting a case against the Indian government asking it to break it’s end-to-end encryption – so the government can track malicious users. While the Indian government’s intent is for a better national security, WhatsApp said the move would violate the users’ right to privacy, thus can’t do it. Forcing it to do so will cause the platform to leave the country, says WhatsApp.
A Battle For Privacy, Ft. WhatsApp India
With over 400 million monthly active users, India is the biggest market for WhatsApp so far. While it’s not the most lucrative one yet, the platform is doing everything to serve Indian users as best as it can. In this pursuit, WhatsApp is fighting India’s IT Rules(Intermediary Guidelines) 2021, that requires large social media companies to tweak their policies according to government orders. A controversial one among them is the breaking of end-to-end encryption for WhatsApp chats – to allow government agencies to track malicious users.
While it’s aimed at spotting and punishing culprits or lawbreakers, WhatsApp argues that it’ll violate the citizens’ right to privacy – a fundamental right. Arguing the case, WhatsApp’s counsel Tejas Karia said, “if we are told to break encryption, then WhatsApp goes“. Furthermore, “We will have to keep a complete chain and we don’t know which messages will be asked to be decrypted. It means millions and millions of messages have to be stored for a number of years“.
Kirtiman Singh, appearing for the central government, defended by saying that a rule of such is needed to stop objectionable content on social platforms, and communal violence. The court too, said the privacy rights were not absolute, and “somewhere balance has to be done“. The Delhi High court ordered the matter to be listed on August 14 for hearing, alongside the batch of petitions challenging several aspects of 2021 IT rules.
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