View of the Supreme Court of India in New Delhi | Photo credit: Sushil Kumar Verma
The Supreme Court on Monday (February 9, 2026) adjourned the WhatsApp-Meta privacy policy case to February 23, 2026. The case was listed on Monday (February 9) before a Bench headed by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant.
During an oral argument before the court, the counsel said that senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who is representing the online platform, was unwell and asked the court to adjourn the case.
The Supreme Court is hearing an appeal by tech giants Meta Platforms and WhatsApp against the CCI’s order fining them ₹213.14 crore for their privacy policies.
February 2026 The Supreme Court said it will not allow instant messaging platform WhatsApp and its parent company Meta to violate the privacy rights of millions of its “silent consumers” in India by sharing and commercializing personal data.
At one point during the hearing, a three-judge bench headed by India’s chief justice Surya Kant, who took a swipe at Meta and WhatsApp, likened the sharing of private data to “a decent way of committing theft” and said, “You must have taken away millions of bytes of data.”
WhatsApp and Meta, led by senior advocates Mukul Rohatgi and Amit Sibal, vehemently protested the court’s observations, arguing that users can “opt out” of sharing their data. They said the prior consent was cardinal. WhatsApp stressed that messages sent and received on its platform were end-to-end encrypted.
Published – 9 Feb 2026 11:20 AM IST
