WhatsApp had lodged a complaint against the Indian government stating that new rules may invade privacy

WhatsApp has lodged a legal complaint against the Indian government in Delhi and has been looking forward to remove regulations coming into force. Many industry experts have stated that the move is going to force Facebook to withdraw privacy protections.

The lawsuit claims to ask the Delhi High Court for declaring one of the new rules as a violation of privacy rights according to the Indian Constitution as it would require the social media companies to identify the “first person from whom the news or information originates” whenever the authorities demand for it.

Under the previous law, WhatsApp is required to unmask only those people who are accused of wrongdoing, however the new law makes it difficult for the company for doing that as a standalone practice. Since the WhatsApp messages are encrypted from end-to-end, in order to comply with the new law, WhatsApp may be required to break encryption for both receivers as well as the originators of information.

A WhatsApp official had declined to make any statement regarding the same.

The lawsuit has only escalated matters between the rising concerns among the Indian Prime Minister and tech giants including Google parent Alphabet, Facebook, and Twitter in one of their major markets around the world.

Matters have escalated ever since police paid a visit to the Twitter office this past week. Twitter had labeled one of the posts from a ruling party spokesperson and others as “misleading and manipulated media,” stating that content was forged.

The companies’ response to the new laws has become a matter of intense speculation since they were revealed back in February, which happens to be 90 days before the stated time to go into effect.

The parent company, Facebook and other tech rivals have been investing heavily in India over the pandemic situation. However, many company officials are skeptical of the rising heavy-handed regulations posed by the present government which could jeopardize the growth prospects of these companies in the market.