There’s no arguing with the broad thrust of CCI’s order on WhatsApp’s use of data

On 23 January, the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal partially stayed an order of the Competition Commission of India imposing a penalty of ₹213.14 crore on WhatsApp and its parent company Meta for coercing its users to accept the WhatsApp Privacy Policy of 2021. The CCI held that the ‘take-it-or-leave-it’ nature of this policy was unfair and violated India’s competition law, as it had compelled users to accept expanded data collection terms without any ‘opt-out’. The CCI investigation also found that by acquiring user data from WhatsApp and combining it with data from Facebook and Instagram, Meta strengthened its position in the online display advertising market. However, with NCLAT staying the embargo, WhatsApp must To avoid such a fiasco, the CCI must consider approaching the appellate tribunal to clarify that consent guidelines also apply to data shared for advertising purposes. It is heartening to see the CCI’s willingness to look into privacy issues from a competition law perspective even though digital personal data has a dedicated law for its protection.