The issue cropped up before a bench headed by Chief Justice
S A Bobde which was hearing a plea filed by Rajya Sabha MP Binoy Viswam seeking
direction to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for framing regulation to ensure
that data collected on UPI platforms is not "exploited" or used in
any manner other than for processing payments.
"An allegation is that WhatsApp data can be hacked by a
software called Pegasus," the bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna
and V Ramasubramanian, told senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who was appearing for
WhatsApp. Sibal said "these are all allegations. None of them are
correct."
WhatsApp had said last year that it was suing an Israeli
surveillance firm that is reportedly behind the technology that helped unnamed
entities' spies to hack into phones of roughly 1,400 users. During the hearing
conducted through video-conferencing on Monday, senior advocate Krishnan
Venugopal, appearing for Viswam, told the bench that RBI has filed an affidavit
in the matter and the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) should also
make its stand clear in the matter.
"Additional safeguards should be there. WhatsApp's
security is not up to the mark and the third point is of data localisation.
Data is being shared by companies like Facebook, WhatsApp and Amazon. This is a
breach of privacy. All the data are being shared in violation of the NPCI
norms," Venugopal said.
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