Facebook, when it acquired WhatsApp back in early
2014 said that it won't have the capacity to link the WhatsApp users to their
Facebook accounts. In any case, things being what they are, turns out it wasn't
so difficult after all. A year ago, the organization changed the WhatsApp terms
of services to do just that: link the WhatsApp and Facebook profiles belonging
to the same user.
Facebook had allowed many of its users to opt out,
yet that wasn't sufficient for the regulators. Germany had even requested
Facebook to quit gathering WhatsApp data last September, a similar thing
happened in the UK several months later and now fast forward to December 2017;
there be yet another European nation issuing similar order.
Facebook's messaging service WhatsApp was given a
one-month final proposal by one of Europe's strictest privacy watchdogs, which
requested it to quit offering user data to its parent without getting the
necessary assent. France's information insurance specialist also known as the
data protection authority, CNIL gave quite a cautioning to WhatsApp by issuing
a formal notice, scrutinizing it for "inadequate and insufficient"
participation and cooperation.
The decision comes a year later after the European
Union privacy authorities (security specialists) said that they had
"genuine concerns" about the sharing of WhatsApp user data for
purposes that were excluded in the terms of conditions and the privacy policy
when people had signed up to the service.
However, even after the EU slapped Facebook with a
€110 million fine over unlawful WhatsApp information sharing, France says that
it has still not collaborated with information security expert CNIL, and could
confront another sanction if it doesn't start thinking responsibly inside 30
days. The social network is as yet exchanging Whatsapp information for "business
intelligence," it claims, and the only possible way that clients can quit
is by uninstalling the application.
It was a French regulator, who saw that WhatsApp was
sharing user information like phone numbers to Facebook for "business
insight" reasons. When it over and over made a request to take a look at
the information being shared, Facebook said that it is put away in the US, and
"it considers that it is only subject to the legislation of the country,"
as per the CNIL. The regulator countered that whenever information is assembled
in France, it naturally turns into the authority in charge.
The information exchanges from WhatsApp to Facebook
occur to some extent without the users' assent, nor the legitimate interest of
WhatsApp, CNIL said.
France says that while the notice was issued to
Facebook, it's additionally intended to exhort users that this "gigantic
information exchange from WhatsApp to Facebook" was occurring. "The
best way to deny the information exchange for 'business insight' purposes is to
uninstall the application," it adds. In any case, Facebook guarantees that
it will keep on working with the CNIL to ensure that the users comprehend what
data it gathers as well as how the data is utilized.
The merging of WhatsApp's data with Facebook was the
first step taken by Facebook a year ago towards monetising the stage since the
social network's CEO Mark Zuckerberg bought the company for about $22bn in
2014.