Video Editor: Abhishek Sharma & Sandeep Suman
WhatsApp is battling to retain its core values in India.
The app has fought many battles in the country – from fake news, hate speech to proxy election battles.
But now, it finds itself in a tough legal battle – in the Madras High Court.
It is no exaggeration to say that this time, WhatsApp is fighting for its soul.
And what is its soul? Encryption.
To better understand just why WhatsApp has landed itself in court, it’s important to understand why encryption lies at the heart of WhatsApp’s design.
What is Encryption?
Encryption is the method by which our private messages are converted from a readable plaintext form to an encoded version that can only be decoded by another person if they have access to a decryption key.
Think of encryption as a lock that secures our most private communications. WhatsApp uses a particularly strong lock that can only be opened by two keys – one is with the sender of the message and the other is with the receiver of the message.
This is known as end-to-end encryption and it ensures that no one else – NOT even WhatsApp can read your texts.
An Enduring Policy Stalemate
Therefore, the fundamental debate on the nature of encryption technology can be divided into two columns:
On one side are law enforcement agencies and the state. On the other are citizens and technology companies.
On the one hand, strong encryption protects our most personal communication: our intimate photographs, our financial transactions, as well as upholds our fundamental right to privacy.
On the other side, law enforcement agencies and governments have demanded access to encrypted communications in the interest of national security, i.e. to be able to know what criminals or terrorists are planning.
And this is where encryption has given the tech world an enduring policy stalemate for decades.
Strong encryption is great for the privacy of citizens and keeps our most intimate and personal information secure. However, weak encryption allows the police and intelligence agencies to track criminals and terrorists.
So, the current debate in India, the US, Australia, the UK, and France is this: Should encryption in our smartphones be so strong that there is no backdoor to allow access to law enforcement agencies?
What’s Happening in India?
At a time when we see government policies pushed through, sometimes without any consultation, in a rare instance in 2015 the government had withdrawn a policy after major public backlash. It was the Draft Encryption Policy – which required citizens to store the plaintext of their communications for a period of 90 days.
The withdrawal of the policy doesn’t mean the Centre doesn’t wish to get around encryption.
In fact, IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on 29 July said the government will insist on WhatsApp developing a mechanism to trace origin of messages in cases where the platform is misused by terrorists and ‘rogue’ elements.
What governments and the police are basically saying is – personal data of people should be protected with a lock but WhatsApp should give them a copy of the key to this lock.
But this is not a unique question.
An identical demand was made by the FBI to Apple in 2016 when it wanted Tim Cook to break encryption of an iPhone belonging to a suspected terrorist. This led to what we today call the Second Crypto War. Yes, the United states has seen two “wars” over encryption between law enforcement, intelligence agencies and tech companies.
And this is similar to the question that the Madras High Court asked WhatsApp on 24 July. According to a Medianama report, Facebook and WhatsApp have now filed a transfer petition to move the traceability case from the Madras High Court to the Supreme Court.
The Court wanted to know from WhatsApp’s lawyers Kapil Sibal and Arvind Datar if it is possible to trace the originator of a message on the app. WhatsApp submitted to the court that they themselves do not have access to this information and any demand to find out who is sending what message will compromise encryption.
Where Do We Go From Here?
The high court now wants to know if there’s a way to trace the originator of a forwarded message without disturbing encryption.
When FBI wanted Apple to allow them access to an encrypted iPhone, Tim Cook had said, “This moment calls for public discussion.” And this is true for the 400 million Indians as well who use WhatsApp daily.
Encryption forms a core pillar of the debate on privacy. The fundamental fear of weakening encryption is surveillance.
Edward Snowden’s revelations in 2016 exposed the United States spying on its own citizens by scooping up millions of phone records . The Guardian’s reports revealed how the United States’ National Security Agency, through a secret programme called PRISM also had direct access to the servers of US tech giants like Google, Facebook, Microsoft and Apple among others.
While the US has resisted all attempts at modifying encryption standards in devices, India appears to have braced itself for a long legal fight on citizen privacy versus national security.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)