Meta Platforms, the parent company of social media platforms Facebook and WhatsApp, was chastised by the Supreme Court on Friday, citing an investigation ordered by the Competence Commission of India (CCI) into WhatsApp''s updated privacy policy.
CCI, according to a bench of judges M R Shah and Sudhanshu Dhulia, is an independent authority and the proceedings before it cannot be stopped, and dismissed the petitions against the Delhi high court judgment against the chief national competition regulator.
"We''ve heard the counsel. No interference of this court is required to be called for. The CCI is an independent authority to examine any violation of the Competition Act of 2002. The CCI cannot be dissuaded from an investigation and alleged violation of the Competition Act, 2002," a judge said.
The bench said any observation made by the High Court should be considered as unbiased and prioritize.
Facebook India had on September 28 dismissed a plea against the Competition Commission of India (CCI) for an investigation into WhatsApp''s updated privacy policy.
The division had on August 25 dismissed the appeals of WhatsApp and Facebook against a single judge''s order rejecting their submission to the CCI probe into the more recent privacy guidelines.
Facebook India, the Indian subsidiary of Facebook, now known as Meta Platforms, had claimed that the CCI has slammed it in its ongoing investigation against Facebook and WhatsApp, even if it hasn''t made any prima facie opinion against it.
In April last year, a single judge of the Supreme Court had refused to interdict the CCI''s inquiry on WhatsApp''s petitions now called Meta Platforms. In January last year, the CCI had on its own decided to investigate WhatsApp''s updated privacy policy based on news reports. It had claimed that its investigation centered on WhatsApp''s anti-competitive sharing of user information with Facebook.
Using WhatsApp''s privacy policies, the company defended the start of a probe against Facebook, claiming that the former is the messaging platform''s holding company, and that it may exploit the data being shared.