CCI’S Antitrust Probe Against Whatsapp: Big Data Processing And Competition Law

Anup Menon V, Adjunct Faculty (Law), Prayaga College of Corporate Studies

INTRODUCTION

WhatsApp found itself in the eye of the storm earlier this year when it announced that it is rolling out its new privacy policy, the acceptance of which would be mandatory for WhatsApp users in India. The fallout of this announcement, albeit relatively innocuous, forced the company to put its plan to mandatorily have users consent to its new privacy policy on hold. The center of the controversy is WhatsApp sharing some of the user data with Facebook, its parent company. The data so shared will be utilized by Facebook to build user profiles for targeted advertising. The Competition Commission of India (“CCI”) took suo motu cognizance of the matter and ordered a probe against WhatsApp and Facebook.1 The order of the CCI and its jurisdiction in the matter was challenged before the Delhi High Court. However, vide its order dated 22nd April 2021, the Court dismissed the plea against the CCI’s order for a probe2, in effect, giving the green light to the Directorate General’s (“DG”) office to conduct a detailed investigation in order to find out if the actions of the companies under probe have antitrust implications.