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India Inc. cautions employees on WhatsApp privacy policy changes
Tata
Steel Ltd. and other companies, Indian and multinational, have begun issuing
advisories to staff asking them to avoid sharing sensitive information on WhatsApp and stop using the platform for critical
business calls.
This
follows the messaging giant’s new privacy policy and terms of
service that detail how it plans to share data with parent Facebook.
Cybersecurity experts said boards are asking companies to issue such alerts to
avoid compliance issues later on. The parliamentary committee on information
technology, which is expected to meet Monday on 5G, could discuss the WhatsApp
privacy update, said people familiar with the matter.
Tata
Steel has urged staff not to post important corporate matters or conduct
business meetings on the platform, in an email seen by ET.“According to the new
policy, WhatsApp will be integrated with Facebook and Instagram with possible
exchange and sharing of data among these platforms... We strongly advise the
use of Microsoft Office 365 facilities and Teams for official communication,”
stated the email sent by Mrinal Kanti Pal, chief of cloud infrastructure,
network and cybersecurity at Tata Steel. The company didn’t respond to queries.
Companies
are also cognizant about potential liability issues.
‘Ensuring
Compliance’
“We have
been advising companies since WhatsApp’s privacy policy update. Not just Indian
companies, we are also working with very large global companies on the matter,”
said Sanchit Vir Gogia, CEO of Greyhound Research. “The boards are directing
companies to issue advisories to staff members to ensure compliance. This is
also about safeguarding themselves. They are shifting the liability on the
users.”
Gogia
said companies in the services sector and others are issuing such alerts. “In
lesser compliant industries, there is rampant use of WhatsApp. Groups are
standard. Screenshots are taken. WhatsApp has entered the corporate space in a
very big way. Companies cannot ban it. But they can enforce policies around
it,” he said. “With the recent development, large companies are reminding staff
that the platform is not the official channel of communication.”
Communication
via mails, texts
Many
companies are sensitising employees and evaluating other options, said Sivarama
Krishnan, cybersecurity leader for Asia Pacific at PwC.
“Companies
in the pharma and financial services space are doing this,” he said. “In the
past, financial services firms shared a lot of communication through WhatsApp.
They are restricting communications to emails or personal messages instead of
WhatsApp now. Many services companies are evaluating other options. WhatsApp
has integrated well with businesses. Companies which have made WhatsApp a basis
for sensitive communication are now moving away.”
WhatsApp
said Friday that the update doesn’t change its data sharing practices with
Facebook and won’t impact how people communicate privately with friends and
family wherever they are in the world. A company spokesperson said the update
will make it easier for people to make purchases and get help from businesses
on the messaging platform. “We updated the privacy policy to describe that,
going forward, businesses can choose to receive secure hosting services from
our parent company Facebook to help manage their communications with their
customers on WhatsApp,” the spokesperson said.
Other
Platforms
Senior
professionals in companies have conveyed to employees that they need to tone
down the usage of WhatsApp and use business communication platforms such as Slack instead, said Rahul Tyagi, cofounder at
enterprise cybersecurity firm Lucideus.
“WhatsApp
was never meant for business communication. WhatsApp and other similar
applications were designed for convenience,” he said. “Organisations are moving
to platforms such as Slack because even in other messaging applications such as
Telegram and Signal, there are certain settings that need to
be enabled in order to get the best ROI.”
Every
company will need to take its own stand on the matter, said Rituparna
Chakraborty, executive vice president at TeamLease Services.
“There is
an uproar all across the world around this,” she said. “A lot of companies have
WhatsApp groups for business dealings. There will be some impact of the privacy
update on company communications for sure.”
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13 Feb, 2021
13 Feb, 2021