If you don’t want Whatsapp to share your data, you can opt out, Sidharth Luthra [Edited]

A public interest litigation filed by students Karmanya Singh Sareen and Shreya Sethi against Whatsapp’s new privacy policy, was heard in the Delhi High Court’s first court today..Senior Advocate Pratibha Singh began the arguments today by presenting an allegedly new development on the Whatsapp website in which Whatsapp claims that user information will be shared with Facebook and the users are given an option of “opting-out” in case they do not want their information shared..Senior Advocate Sidharth Luthra appearing for the respondents argued that using Whatsapp was not a compulsion, and that if users did not want their data to be shared, they could opt out..“Whatsapp is a messaging service that has come in 2012. Before that we were all surviving. If you don’t want Whatsapp to use your data, then you can opt out. Simple.”.Luthra also argued that Whatsapp did not even actually retain any user information except for their names and phone numbers that are used to sign in. Furthermore, all messages including photos, videos, audio notes etc. are encrypted and therefore not accessible to anyone except the sender and the receiver..In response to this, Pratibha Singh presented that portion of the privacy policy that deals with “Affiliated Companies” and states,.As part of the Facebook family of companies, WhatsApp receives information from, and shares information with, this family of companies. We may use the information we receive from them, and they may use the information we share with them, to help operate, provide, improve, understand, customize, support, and market ....Facebook and the other companies in the Facebook family also may use information from us to improve your experiences within their services such as making product suggestions (for example, of friends or connections, or of interesting content) and showing relevant offers and ads…..”.Singh argued that the option of “opting out” allegedly provided by WhatsApp was limited to WhatsApp sharing the users’ data with Facebook in relation to showing relevant advertisements. It did not protect the users from sharing of their information “for other purposes” as stated in the privacy policy..She further argued that under this new policy, if any copyright material is shared on Whatsapp between two creators of the work, Whatsapp will be able to retain that material and claim a derivative copyright over the same. The new privacy policy is creating ripples in Europe and the United States of America..Subsequently Chief Justice G. Rohini and Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal gave the respondents one week to file an affidavit, listing the matter for September 21. The new privacy policy comes into play from September 25..Last edited at 21.40 on September 14, 2016