Facebook has landed up in a soup after it altered WhatsApp’s privacy policy which ends all sort of privacy a user was supposed to enjoy. The updated policy has understandably caused a huge furore across the world with people exploring the option of switching over to WhatsApp’s rivals like Telegram or Signal. Now, the powerful Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) has requested the Indian government to ban WhatsApp and Facebook over the new privacy policy.
The CAIT in its letter to Information and Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad demanded the Central government to either restrict WhatsApp from implementing its new privacy policy or place a ban on the instant messaging app and its parent company Facebook.
“All kinds of personal data, payment transactions, contacts, location and other vital information of a person who is using WhatsApp will be acquired by it and can be used for any purpose by WhatsApp,” claimed the Traders body.
The letter further stated that the “government should immediately restrict WhatsApp from implementing the new policy or put a ban on WhatsApp and its parent company Facebook.” CAIT pointed out how Facebook has over 200 million users in India and allowing it to access the data of every user can pose a serious challenge to not only the economy but also national security.
“The changed privacy policy of WhatsApp is an encroachment on the privacy of an individual and runs against the basic fundamentals of Constitution of India and therefore the CAIT has demanded immediate intervention of the government,” said CAIT Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal.
For the uninitiated, WhatsApp had recently updated its user policy, which gives the platform the right to share user’s information with Facebook and other third-party apps.
What’s worse about this new policy is that the new update comes with a condition that if the user refuses to share data with Facebook, they will have to quit WhatsApp. In other words, the messaging application is forcing the users to accept a policy which exploits their personal data.
Since the time Zuckerberg has bought WhatsApp in 2014, constant attempts have been made to integrate it with the Facebook platform. With 340 million users, India is, by far, the largest market for the messaging platform.
Read More: Zuckerberg finally takes his fangs out: New WhatsApp policy is a dystopian attack on user privacy
While most users will ignore this stipulation, it is pertinent to note that status, group names, icons, frequency and duration of activities, location, device model, operating system, battery level, browser details and whether a user is doing online will be collected by the app.
What is more concerning is that the fact that even the data from the new payment feature, including processing method, transactions and shipment data will be collected. Surely the collection of this amount of unauthorised information infringes the right to privacy of an individual, but it seems that Zuckerberg is indifferent.
CAIT has highlighted important concerns and the Indian government must step in to ensure that the Big Tech companies aren’t allowed to intrude user privacy and have their way as they deem fit.
I would agree with CAIT …. these policies are made to track us over the internet and market products and they make our profiles and these tech technology companies know everything we do on internet …… india should have their own alternative apps