New Delhi: The Delhi High Court today dismissed a plea by WhatsApp and Facebook challenging the decision of the Competition Commission of India (CCI) to investigate the new privacy policy of the intermediary. Saying that there is no merit in the plea, Justice Navin Chawla refused to pass any order stopping the investigation.
The Judge said that though it would have been ‘prudent’ for the CCI to wait for the outcome of the petitions against the privacy policy in the Supreme Court and the Delhi high court but not doing so would not make its investigation order ‘perverse’ or wanting of jurisdiction.
WhatsApp has contended that the CCI need not have ordered the probe since the issue of its privacy policy was before the Supreme Court. Facebook, which owns the instant messaging app, also filed a similar petition challenging the competition watchdog’s March 24 decision.
WhatsApp said the CCI jumped the gun and started the probe when this was not in fact a competition issue. The issue with respect to personal data of the users, and sharing of personalised data, was already before the Supreme Court.
CCI said the probe order was made to gauge whether access to data would lead to abuse by WhatsApp of its dominant position. The commission said it was dealing with the instant messaging app’s new privacy policy that could lead to excessive collection of consumers’ data and the use and sharing of the data in anti competitive context.
