NEW DELHI: WhatsApp chats are end-to-end encrypted which keeps its users secure but the messaging app warns that it will stop its services in India if it is forced to break chat encryption in the near future.
WhatsApp informed this to the Delhi High Court (DHL) this week, where it is facing a big battle to keep its users secure behind its vaunted end-to-end encryption for chats, calls, videos and more.
WhatsApp’s parent company Meta has challenged the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Code of Ethics) Rules 2021.
According to the amended IT rules, companies need to trace chats to identify the sender of the message.
“As a platform, we are saying, if we are asked to break the encryption, then WhatsApp goes,” the company’s lawyer told the high court during Thursday’s hearing.
“There is no such rule anywhere else in the world,” said the lawyer. Not even in Brazil. We have to keep a complete chain and we don’t know which messages will be asked to decrypt. This means that millions and millions of messages will have to be stored for many years.
He further argued that WhatsApp has more than 400 million users in India and they mostly use the app for its privacy features.
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The company argued that “any rules that compromise the privacy of users along with encryption of content violate the fundamental rights guaranteed under Articles 14, 19, and 21 of the Constitution of India.”
The Center had earlier told the Delhi High Court that WhatsApp and Facebook, which monetize users’ information for business or commercial purposes, are not legally entitled to claim that they protect privacy.
While Indian government has repeatedly claimed that WhatsApp and other messaging apps need to allow them to trace the messages under the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules 2021 which is not possible when the chats are secure behind encryption and the keys are not accessible to anyone, including WhatsApp.
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