Thursday, March 28, 2024

Delhi High Court declines WhatsApp plea against CCI notice on privacy policy





The Delhi High Court declined a plea by WhatsApp to put on hold a notice issued by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) seeking information regarding the messaging app’s controversial new privacy policy.

The Division Bench Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani and Justice Jasmeet Singh said that “We would only urge the Director-General CCI to bear in mind that investigation against the appellant is under judicial consideration before a Division Bench of this court.

“For the foregoing reason, we do not consider it appropriate to stay the operation of impugned notice dated June 4, 2021, at this stage,” the order read.

This comes after the CCI had sought certain information regarding the new privacy policy of the social media messaging application. 

Appearing for WhatsApp, Senior Advocate Harish Salve informed that they had been served with a notice in spite of informing the CCI that of their decision to defer implementation of the policy beyond May 15.

Salve also informed the court that related challenges are also pending before the Supreme Court. 

Responding to it, the court said that an application seeking a stay also stands before the CJI, on which notice has already been issued to the DG. 

Instant messaging app WhatsApp updated its privacy policy earlier this year. It gave users time till May 15 to accept the new policy.

However, the policy was challenged through a number of petitions both in the Supreme Court of India and the Delhi High Court.

The CCI then launched a probe into WhatsApp’s new privacy policy. A notice was served to Facebook and WhatsApp in this regard on March 24. 

Then social media giants Facebook and WhatsApp have filed fresh plea sought to stay on the CCI’s notices asking them to furnish certain information for the inquiry conducted by it. The notices were issued to WhatsApp and Facebook on June 4 and June 8 respectively.

 


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