WhatsApp Gets Legal Notice in India for Middle Finger Emoji

The legal notice asked WhatsApp to remove the emoji within 15 days.

(Photo: iStock)

A Delhi-based advocate on Tuesday sent a legal notice to mobile messaging app WhatsApp, asking it to remove the "middle finger" emoji within 15 days.

Gurmeet Singh, who practises as a lawyer in city courts in Delhi, said showing the middle finger is not only illegal but an obscene and lewd gesture – an offence in India.

In the notice, the advocate said: "...showing of middle finder is not only offensive but a highly belligerent, invasive, obscene, lewd gesture."

As per the Indian Penal Code Sections 354 and 509, it is an offence to show obscene, lewd, offensive gestures to females. Use of a lewd, offensive, obscene gesture by anyone is hereby illegal also as aforesaid. As per section 6 of the Criminal Justice (Public Order) Act, 1994 showing of the middle finger is also an offence in Ireland.

Gurmeet Singh, Advocate

"By offering to use middle finger emoji in your app, you (WhatsApp Inc) are directly abetting the use of offensive, lewd, obscene gesture," the notice said.

Therefore, it is requested that the middle finger emoji or character or photo must be removed from WhatsApp within 15 days from the date of the present legal notice, it said, threatening to file civil or criminal cases if the app fails to remove it.

Earlier, WhatsApp was in the news a couple of months ago due to its data sharing policy. It was asked to stop sharing data with Facebook where France’s privacy watchdog had issued a formal notice to the message sharing app.

Also Read: WhatsApp asked to stop sharing data with Facebook

On 25 August, 2016, WhatsApp released a new version of its Terms of Service and Privacy Policy where it explained that "from now on, its users' data are transferred to Facebook for three purposes: targeted advertising, security and evaluation and improvement of services (business intelligence).”