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Sending a direct message to WhatsApp, the Government asked the messaging platform, to appoint a grievance officer in India too, having one who based out of its headquarters in California alone will not suffice.
Ravi Shankar Prasad, Minister of Electronics and IT, and Law & Justice, told reporters here after meeting WhatsApp’s Vice President, Chris Daniels that he asked the company to have a corporate presence in India and underscored the need for traceability of messages to identify the origin of a message in case of criminal offences.
“We discussed what we had discussed in the past also… they have appointed a grievance officer in the US and have corporate presence in India. But, I suggested that there should be one grievance officer in India too. The company has said that they are already registered in India and soon they will start operations,” said Prasad.
On traceability of messages, he said, “We emphasised that when we say traceability, we are not talking about decrypting messages. We insist rather on location and identification of the sender of WhatsApp messages when such messages lead to provocation of violence, heinous offences, and other serious crimes.”
Prasad said that WhatsApp being an important instrument of message circulation even during the elections, it is appropriate that the institutional integrity of the platform is maintained.
“They (WhatsApp) have assured that they will work with my department in preventing circulation of spam farms… misuse by third parties,” he said.
The Facebook-owned company has been under pressure for months to set up a mechanism to clamp down on fake messages on its platform, especially after mass circulation of fake messages during the elections, in the recent past, and mob killings.
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