Calling WhatsApp’s refusal to comply with the new IT rules as a “clear act of defiance,” the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has said that while it respects the right to privacy, it is not an unlimited right and will come with reasonable restrictions.
The government was responding to WhatsApp’s lawsuit against the IT rules, which was filed in the Delhi High Court on May 25, the last date for compliance with the new rules.
“The Government of India is committed to ensuring the Right of Privacy to all its citizens but at the same time it is also the responsibility of the government to maintain law and order and ensure national security,” Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said, adding that “none of the measures proposed by India will impact the normal functioning of WhatsApp in any manner whatsoever and for the common users, there will be no impact.”
Calling the debate of end-to-end encryption misplaced, Prasad said, “Whether Right to Privacy is ensured through using encryption technology or some other technology is entirely the purview of the social media intermediary. It is WhatsApp’s responsibility to find a technical solution, whether through encryption or otherwise, that both happen.”
WhatsApp’s main argument is that traceability would require it to track every single message and thus break its end-to-end encryption protocol.
Surjitt Sahani
