Harish Salve, Senior Advocate appearing for WhatsApp has told the Delhi High Court today that WhatsApp will NOT ENFORCE the new Privacy Policy until the government passes the Data Protection Bill. The social media giant has also confirmed that it will not restrict the functionality for users who have not accepted the controversial privacy policy, till the bill is passed.

The Data Protection Bill will define how data can be processed.

The social media giant owned by Facebook has also confirmed that it will continue to show the policy updates to users who yet to accept, and for those who have accepted it, the policy will remain in force. The Delhi High Court is hearing a plea by Facebook challenging the Competition Commission of India's inquiry into the new privacy policy.

WhatsApp has been giving policy update reminders to users regularly and the company says that a majority of users have accepted the new policy. However, the company will NOT DELETE the accounts of users who have not yet accepted the new terms, till the Personal Data Protection Bill becomes law.

India, with more than 50 crore users, is the biggest market of WhatsApp and the IT Ministry pointed out that it was discriminatory treatment by WhatsApp for Indian users as against those in European countries, where users did not have to compulsorily accept the updated terms.

Source: Media Reports