The CAIT in India (Confederation of All India Traders) has asked the government in the country to ban the use of WhatsApp and Facebook in the country following on from the revised privacy policy WhatsApp is forcing users to agree to by 8th February if they want to continue using the service. WhatsApp has over 200 million users in India and since the news regarding the privacy policy, users have been flocking to more secure alternatives, such as Signal and Telegram and in some cases, iMessage.
CAIT wrote to Information and Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad requesting that the Indian government ban the use of WhatsApp as well as Facebook, its parent company. The CAIT said that “all kinds of personal data, payment transactions, contacts, location and other vital information of a person who is using WhatsApp will be acquired by it and can be used for any purpose by WhatsApp”.
However, WhatsApp has said:
“To further increase transparency, we updated the privacy policy to describe that going forward businesses can choose to receive secure hosting services from our parent company Facebook to help manage their communications with their customers on WhatsApp. Though of course, it remains up to the user whether or not they want to message with a business on WhatsApp.”
