WhatsApp, owned by Meta Inc., has threatened to leave India if it is forced to break encryption of messages and calls on its instant messaging platform.
“As a platform, we are saying, if we are told to break encryption, then WhatsApp goes,” the lawyer appearing for WhatsApp told the Delhi high court.
This marks yet another development in the conflict between platforms and the government over the sanctity of encrypted messages.
What is end-to-end encryption?
WhatsApp introduced default end-to-end encryption for all messages exchanged and calls made through the platform in 2016. This was devised to ensure that only the sender and receiver of the message would be privy to its contents. Though other platforms offer this feature, WhatsApp is the most widely used messaging platform in India with around 400 million users.
Encryption is a process where messages, once sent by the reader, and converted to secret and complex codes, making them unreadable by anyone else. These messages are decoded and turned readable only when they reach the recipient.
What is the case?
The case revolved around the 2021 Information Technology (IT) rules for social media intermediaries requiring the messaging app to trace chats and make provisions to identify the first originator of information. The Narendra Modi government has directed large social media platforms like WhatsApp, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram to comply with the latest norms, which is significant when questionable content is spread on platforms.
However, WhatsApp and Meta have challenged these the IT rules, asserting that it will severely undermine the privacy of its users which is important to maintain in this digital age.
When asked by a bench headed by Acting Chief Justice Manmohan if the problem has been considered in any other country, the lawyer stated, “There is no such rule anywhere else in the world. Not even in Brazil. We will have to keep a complete chain and we don’t know which messages will be asked to be decrypted. It means millions and millions of messages will have to be stored for a number of years.”
