WhatsApp won’t limit users’ functionalities till India’s PDP is in effect

In a statement to the media, the company said it had responded to the Government of India’s recent letter (seont on May 18) asking for the controversial new policy to be withdrawn, and said it will continue reminding users about the policy “at least” till India’s Personal Data Protection (PDP) bill comes into effect.

“We have responded to the Government of India’s letter and assured them that the privacy of users remains our highest priority. As a reminder, the recent update does not change the privacy of people’s personal messages. Its purpose is to provide additional information about how people can interact with businesses if they choose to do so.

We will not limit the functionality of how WhatsApp works in the coming weeks. Instead, we will continue to remind users from time to time about the update as well as when people choose to use relevant optional features, like communicating with a business that is receiving support from Facebook.

We hope this approach reinforces the choice that all users have whether or not they want to interact with a business. We will maintain this approach until at least the forthcoming PDP law comes into effect,” a spokesperson from WhatsApp said in a statement.

The world’s largest messaging platform had started enforcing its new policy from May 15, despite concerns from users and the government, and a court case against it. WhatsApp has claimed on multiple occasions, including today, that the new policy does not change privacy of people’s personal messages. The company had deferred the update from February 8 to May 15 after privacy concerns from users across the world. It also said that it wouldn’t be deleting user accounts, but would start limiting functionality for those users who hadn’t accepted the policy after May 15.

The Indian government had given WhatsApp seven days to respond to its letter, alleging that the letter was in violation of Indian laws. In a statement at the time, WhatsApp had said that the majority of its users had already accepted the policy.

“Our goal is to provide information about new options we are building that people will have, to message a business on WhatsApp, in the future. While the majority of users who have received the new terms of service have accepted them, we appreciate some people haven’t had the chance to do so yet. No accounts were deleted on May 15 because of this update and no one in India lost functionality of WhatsApp either. We will follow up with reminders to people over the next several weeks. We’re grateful for the important role WhatsApp plays in people’s lives and we’ll take every opportunity to explain how we protect people’s personal messages and private information,” the company said in its statement on May 19.

The Indian government had also written a similar letter to WhatsApp in January, asking the company to withdraw its policy. The letter suggested that the policy may be in violation of India’s upcoming data protection laws and was in violation of its Information Technology (IT) rules.

“As you may be aware, the Personal Data Protection Bill, which is being discussed by a Joint Committee of the Parliament, is focused on the core value of purpose limitation in the processing of personal data. As per the changes to the WhatsApp Privacy Policy, any information shared with any Facebook Company can be used for an expansive variety of purposes, which may not be reasonably expected by users of WhatsApp,” the government said in that letter.