PIL against Truecaller: Bombay High Court issues notice over alleged privacy breach by Truecaller

The PIL filed by one Shashank Posture was heard by a Bench headed by Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice GS Kulkarni on Wednesday. “We have heard the petitioner for some time and we are of the opinion that a notice is required to be issued to respondents,” the bench said. The bench issued notices to National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI), Central and the State Government giving them three weeks to file reply.

It was contented by the petitioner that the Truecaller app collects data of all users. It shares such data without the users' consent with its partners and dumps the liability on the users. He added that the user is left with no choice in this manipulative setup and Truecaller also registers users for UPI service without their consent.

Google India, Bharati Airtel, and ICICI Bank are some of the companies which are allegedly getting benefitted from data sharing done by Truecaller. The petitioner also added that the government authorities had approved Truecaller app “without proper checks and in contravention of the information security practices rules”.

According to the statement of Truecaller officials on Thursday, Truecaller had not received any formal communication on the PIL and they denied the allegations of sharing user data with third-party companies.

According to ToI, the Truecaller spokesperson added that "we would like to assure all Truecaller users that their data is safe. Truecaller does not sell or share user data. We deeply care about our users and their data, and would like to assure them that we securely handle their data and process it as per our privacy policy.”

The bench has listed the matter on July 29 for further hearing.