WhatsApp and the wait for Data Protection Bill

Harish Salve, WhatsApp’s counsel, has pressed the pause button on a legal brawl by telling the Delhi High Court that the messaging service provider will not enforce its new ‘privacy policy and terms of service’ until the Personal Data Protection (PDP) Bill, 2019, becomes law. WhatsApp can afford to wait. A Joint Committee of the Parliament that is examining the PDP Bill was given more time to do its work in March this year – till the first week of the monsoon session of 2021 of the Parliament. Since the monsoon session is scheduled to begin in July 19, the extended time is coming to an end very soon. Unless, yet another extension – the fifth – is given. Some experts have wondered whether the government is trying to cover up its own failure to pass such an important legislation as the PDP, which is more granular than the existing laws relating to personal data, by narrowly interpreting the existing laws to suit its convenience. Also read: WhatsApp tells HC privacy policy on hold till Data Protection Bill comes“Rather than vilify a company for following the letter of the law, India should focus on why there isn’t a better one,”…
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