Supreme Court dismisses WhatsApp's appeal against CCI probe into its privacy policy
WhatsApp and Meta had approached the Supreme Court challenging the order of a division bench of the Delhi High Court passed in August this year, wherein the challenge to a CCI probe had been held to be devoid of merits.
The Supreme Court today dismissed an appeal filed by WhatsApp Inc and Meta challenging the Delhi High Court order allowing the probe by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) into WhatsApp's new privacy policy.
The Delhi High Court had recently dismissed appeals filed by WhatsApp & Facebook (now Meta) challenging its single-judge bench's order which had also upheld the CCI probe order. Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Subramonium Prasad had held that the plea by WhatsApp was devoid of merits.
Today, while dismissing the appeal, a bench of Justices MR Shah and Sudhanshu Dhulia observed that proceedings before the CCI have to be completed expeditiously.
The CCI ordered an investigation into the app's new privacy policy last year on its own, claiming that it violated the Competition Act of 2000. The commission issued notices to both platforms, claiming that their privacy policies were neither transparent nor based on users' voluntary consent.
The commission dubbed the new terms and conditions "take-it-or-leave-it," claiming that they lacked clarity and did not provide users with a clear understanding of them.
Before the High Court, WhatsApp argued that as the privacy policy in question was being reviewed by the Supreme Court, the investigation cannot proceed until that matter is resolved.
In May last year, the high court division bench of Chief Justice DN Patel & Justice Jasmeet Singh issued notice in the appeal against dismissal of petition filed by Facebook & Whatsapp challenging the CCI’s order for probe.
The appeal was filed against the order dated April 22, 2021 passed by Single Bench of Justice Navin Chawla wherein, Whatsapp’s & Facebook’s appeal against the order dated March 24, 2021 passed by the CCI in Re: Updated Terms of Service and Privacy Policy for WhatsApp Users (Suo Moto Case No. 01 of 2021) vide which the Commission ordered a probe into Whatsapp updated privacy policy for breaching Competition Law was dismissed.
Justice Chawla had noted that CCI’s order could not be quashed merely because it did not await the outcome of the cases pending before the Supreme Court & High court. The court had said that it did not see any merits in the petitions of Facebook & Whatsapp to interdict the investigation directed by the CCI.
The investigation ordered u/S 26(1) of the Competition Act, 2002 came against the backdrop of registration of a suo moto case by CCI after various media reports reported WhatsApp Inc’s updated privacy policy & terms of service as per which WhatsApp users were mandatorily required to accept the terms & conditions to retain their WhatsApp account information.
Case Title: Meta Platforms, WhatsApp vs. CCI