WhatsApp Bans Nearly 10 Million Indian Accounts Every Month: Government Raises Concerns Over Misuse and Lack of Transparency

The misuse of WhatsApp accounts on a large scale is raising serious concerns and issues to the Indian government. The Meta-controlled platform has already banned more than 10 million accounts against monthly violations. Although these bans and enforces are carried out to prevent scams, nevertheless, the authorities allege that the absence of transparency and collaboration with the messaging service is posing a problem and impeding the process of fully monitoring these accounts and discouraging them from abusing them.

Why Indian Government Concerned?

As per the report in Economic Times, on average, WhastApp has blocked 9.8 million Indian accounts monthly until October. This ban was issued following breaches of the terms of services of the tech giant, and it is premised on behavioral cues of scams, spam, and other violations of the policy.

However, Indian officials indicate that despite their banning of these WhastApp accounts, they still tend to appear in other applications, such as telegram and they proceed with their frauds through telegram. Continuous use of the Indian mobile numbers, both in the country and internationally, has been a big issue even as the government continues to put efforts in checking it.

Challenges

One of the major hurdles that Indian Government is facing is WhatsApp policy of not sharing information about banned accounts. While, the company publishes monthly report about how many accounts are banned, indicating numbers, but it doesn’t reveal the exact details of those numbers. This makes it difficult for officials to verify if the numbers are truly gone or linked to some other platforms.

Officials made clear that they are not asking private information or private user data, but they merely need the numbers to cross-check against fraudulent activities.

Scams, Fraud, and OTT App Misuse

Scammers in India are exploiting messaging platforms like WhatsApp and Telegram because they function without an active SIM card once registered. The report further reveals that most of fraudulent cases, especially 90% of digital impersonation occurs on WhatsApp. This highlights the urgency to tackle the situation and tracking those numbers. Verifying SIM issuance, know-your-customer (KYC) details, and patterns of account creation are critical steps in addressing these issues.

Government Requests Collaboration from WhastApp

The government has requested WhatsApp and other platforms to provide detailed breakdown of these banned accounts so that they can investigate and take action toward them. They also requested to remove 2.9 million WhatsApp profiles and groups that are linked to illegal activities until November.