Meta Rebukes India’s WhatsApp Antitrust Ruling, Plans Legal Challenge to $25M Fine

Meta Platforms, Inc. on Tuesday fired back at India’s competition watchdog’s ruling that would place restrictions on data sharing with WhatsApp and fine the company $25 million.

Meta says it will legally challenge the Competition Commission of India (CCI) ruling directing WhatsApp not to share user data for advertising with other Meta-owned applications for five years. The CCI’s investigation started in 2021 over WhatsApp’s privacy policy that allowed data sharing between Meta and its other applications.

“Sharing of user data collected on WhatsApp with other Meta companies … for purposes other than for providing WhatsApp service shall not be made a condition for users to access WhatsApp Service in India,” the CCI said in a statement after the Monday ruling.

A spokesperson for Meta on Tuesday said that the company’s 2021 update did not change the privacy of users’ personal messages. “We also ensured no one would have their accounts deleted or lose functionality of WhatsApp service because of this update,” the spokesperson said.

For CCI, the issue is that part of the 2021 service update required mandatory data sharing with Meta’s other applications to continue using WhatsApp. “Under the previous privacy policy … WhatsApp users were given the option to decide whether they wanted to share their data with Facebook,” CCI stated in a release.

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The ruling demands Meta offers WhatsApp users in India the choice to manage data sharing through an opt-out option displayed “prominently” through an in-app notification, and the option to review and modify their choice.

Meta Antitrust Woes Pile Up

Last week, a US judge ruled that a Federal Trade Commission lawsuit alleging Facebook holds an illegal social media monopoly could move forward. That lawsuit, first launched in 2020, seeks to break up Meta, which also owns photo-sharing site Instagram.

Meanwhile, the European Commission fined Meta more than $845 million for allegedly breaching EU antitrust rules by tethering its online classified ads service to its Facebook platform.

Margrethe Vestager, executive vice president for the Commission’s competition police, scolded Meta over its practices, saying, “Meta must now stop this behavior.”

In recent years, global regulators have taken a tougher stance on Big Tech companies.