2024-04-28 14:43:20
WhatsApp told Delhi High Court that it can shut down its app in India. Actually the company has said this while hearing a case. Meta said it will shut down the app in India if it is asked to break end-to-end encryption of messages. Advocate Tejas Karia, representing WhatsApp, said something in the court during the hearing that surprised everyone.
Karia said before the bench of Acting Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora, ‘As a platform, we want to say that if asked to break encryption, WhatsApp will go.’ A petition challenging 4(2) of the Information Technology Rule 2021 is being heard in the court. This was challenged by Meta and the court was hearing the company’s side.
Actually, this forces the social media platform to keep the information about the first originator of the message. That means, WhatsApp should have information about who shared any message on WhatsApp for the first time. Giving his point of view on this, Karia said, ‘If WhatsApp does this then it will have to store millions for many years. Such a demand has not been made by any country in the world.
Will WhatsApp be closed in India? Big thing said in Delhi High Court
The bench asked Karia whether such a demand has been made in any country in the world. The bench asked, ‘Was such an issue raised in any other country also? Any other country asked you to share information? Even in South America this happened? Kariya replied, ‘Absolutely not, even in Brazil this was not asked.’ Government counsel Kirtiman Singh said, ‘India is the biggest market for WhatsApp with more than 500 million users and in such a situation it is mandatory that the company should have records, especially in view of today’s situation.’