Facebook suspends WhatsApp data sharing across Europe

Facebook's plan to integrate WhatsApp user’s data in its platform received much opposition in India. Though WhatsApp was ordered by the Delhi HC to stop sharing data with Facebook, the court case is still on wheels. However, the social networking giant failed against the pressures of Europe.

According to the Financial Times report, Facebook has 'paused' collecting WhatsApp user data across Europe after receiving extreme pressure from EU data protection authorities.

The suspension was confirmed by the Irish Data Protection Commissioner's office, which said it would take "appropriate action" after it investigated the "quality of the notice and information delivered to users of the WhatsApp service prior to their making a choice to either continue using WhatsApp or to cancel their account".

In August, WhatsApp announced that it will share users' account information with its Parent company in order to improve the ads, products, as well as the notification experiences on the social media. Though the company offered ways to opt out of sharing account details, privacy experts continued to press the two companies.

In late October, the Article 29 Working Party (WP29), which is comprised of the privacy leaders from each of the EU's 28 nations, warned WhatsApp CEO Jan Koum that it had "serious concerns" about changes to the messaging app's terms of service.

EU further said, "WP29 also questions the effectiveness of control mechanisms offered to users to exercise their rights and the effects that the data sharing will have on people that are not a user of any other service within the Facebook family of companies."

"We hope to continue our detailed conversations with the UK Information Commissioner's Office and other data protection officials, and we remain open to working collaboratively to address their questions," said Facebook.

As per the latest information, the services have been temporarily paused. Once Facebook improves “quality of the notice and information delivered to users,” the EU will again be asked to agree to share their data.