South Africa’s Information Regulator (IR) has written to Facebook South Africa “and provided an analysis of some of the concerns that it has” around WhatsApp’s new privacy policy, it said in a statement on Wednesday night, Business Insider SA reported.
Facebook responded to the IR’s statement:
“We are reviewing a letter from the Information Regulator in South Africa, which relates to our privacy policy. To be clear, this update does not expand our ability to share data with Facebook and does not impact the privacy of your messages with friends or family wherever they are in the world. WhatsApp does not share your contacts with Facebook and that policy applies to users everywhere, including in South Africa. We remain fully committed to delivering secure and private communications for everyone.”
South Africa’s Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) lays out strict rules on what companies can – and can not – do with personal information. For some uses of personal information, the agreement of users is not enough; prior permission must be sought from the Information Regulator. And what it believes Facebook plans around cellphone numbers is one such case, the IR says.
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