Congress flays 'draconian' IT rules after WhatsApp sues Centre in HC over 'traceability'

After WhatsApp sued the Centre in the Delhi High Court over the traceability clause, Congress opined that the rules for intermediaries are "draconian". Addressing a press briefing on Wednesday, Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi claimed that this reflected a "big daddy" syndrome on part of the Union government. He said, "It is a control freak syndrome. It is against the vibrant culture of India which is a culture of discourse, deliberation and dissent". Moreover, he delved into the importance of end-to-end encryption with respect to the fundamental right to privacy. 

Congress MP Abhishek Singhvi remarked, "Rule 4 requires an obligation from the social media platform runners to disclose and identify the first originator of the information. Now let us say Mr.Pranav Jha sitting in Canada has originated it and it has come end-to-end encrypted to Mr.Singhvi. Singhvi is in India and it has gone from Singhvi to another person in India- Mr.Surjewala. Now, first and foremost, the social media platform X has to find out under legal obligation who the first originator is. There is a clause that says that if you can't find Mr.Pranav Jha, then Mr.Singhvi will be treated as the first originator because he happens to be in India." 

"As rightly, the technological backbone of privacy is end-to-end encryption. If you do not have end-to-end encryption, it is like keeping a camera open in your drawing room or your bedroom 24x7. And remember, the biggest assault by the government is of course on all social, digital media but principally focused on messaging platforms which is a huge subset of privacy," he added.

WhatsApp files petition in Delhi HC

The Facebook-owned messaging platform reportedly filed the petition in the Delhi HC on May 25, which was the last day to comply with the guidelines. Invoking the Supreme Court's verdict in the 2017 Justice KS Puttaswamy (Retd.) vs Union Of India case, it has argued that the traceability provision is against the fundamental right to privacy. In its petition, WhatsApp has sought direction from the court to declare the aforesaid traceability provision unconstitutional and prevent criminal liability to its employees for non-compliance. 

A WhatsApp spokesperson stated, “Requiring messaging apps to 'trace' chats is the equivalent of asking us to keep a fingerprint of every single message sent on WhatsApp, which would break end-to-end encryption and fundamentally undermines people’s right to privacy. We have consistently joined civil society and experts around the world in opposing requirements that would violate the privacy of our users. In the meantime, we will also continue to engage with the Government of India on practical solutions aimed at keeping people safe, including responding to valid legal requests for the information available to us.”

In response, the Centre issued a press release reiterating its commitment to ensuring the right to privacy of the citizens. Observing that none of these measures will harm the normal functioning of WhatsApp, it stressed that no fundamental right is subject to reasonable restrictions. Claiming that WhatsApp had raised no specific objection to the first originator requirement since October 2018, the Union government highlighted that the messaging platform had mandated a privacy policy wherein it will share the data of all its user with Facebook for marketing and advertising purposes.