WhatsApp, the messaging platform owned by Facebook, has challenged the new IT rules in India. The revised IT rules mandates WhatsApp to reveal the originator of a message. The application over this move by central government has moved Delhi High Court to challenge the rules that come into force from May 26.

The rules require companies to disclose the identity of “originator” of a message, and WhatsApp has called this unconstitutional and a violation of human rights. WhatsApp has said that this would break end-to-end encryption, and fundamentally undermine people’s right to privacy. In a statement, WhatsApp said that “Requiring messaging apps to “trace” chats is the equivalent of asking us to keep a fingerprint of every single message sent on WhatsApp, which would break end-to-end encryption and fundamentally undermines people’s right to privacy.” This all chaos came after companies faced with a deadline to comply with the Indian government’s new rules for social media intermediaries. In its plea, WhatsApp is invoking the 2017 Justice K S Puttaswamy vs Union Of India case to argue that the traceability clause is unconstitutional and against human rights as underlined by the Supreme Court decision. As per WhatsApp, traceability would force private companies to collect and store “who-said-what and who-shared-what” data for billions of messages daily just for the requirement of law enforcement agencies. Traceability cannot be implemented in a way which prevents tampering of the data and make it less secure.

 A spokesperson for the company had said “Pursuant to the IT Rules, we are working to implement operational processes and improve efficiencies. Facebook remains committed to people’s ability to freely and safely express themselves.”

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