Here’s why WhatsApp banned over 14 lakh Indian accounts in February

WhatsApp has announced the number of actions it took in order to address the grievances from both users in India and due to the violations of its terms. These reports are sent on a monthly basis. WhatsApp also reveals the number of user-generated grievances it received and the number of cases in which it took an action.

According to the latest report published by the messaging application, the company banned around 14,26,000 WhatsApp accounts. These accounts were banned in the duration between 1 February to 28 February.

These reports are published in accordance with Rule 4(1)(d) of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021 (IT Rules, 2021). These reports contain information on actions taken by WhatsApp.

The grievances come from users in India via the grievance mechanisms of WhatsApp. The majority of the actions were taken through the company’s prevention and detection methods for violating the laws of India or WhatsApp’s Terms of Service.

In response to user-generated grievances, WhatsApp banned a total of 19 accounts only. However, there were a total of 194 requests that WhatsApp received.

How WhatsApp decides which accounts to ban

In addition to responding to and actioning on user complaints through the grievance channel, WhatsApp also deploys tools and resources to prevent harmful behavior on the platform. The application claims that they are particularly focused on prevention because it is much better to stop harmful activity from happening in the first place than to detect it after harm has occurred.

The abuse detection operates at three stages of an account’s lifestyle: at registration, during messaging, and in response to negative feedback, which WhatsApp receives in the form of user reports and blocks. A team of analysts augments these systems to evaluate edge cases and help improve the app’s effectiveness over time. The number of Indian accounts banned by WhatsApp between 1 February and 28 February was done using the abuse detection approach, which also includes action taken in furtherance to negative feedback received from users via the “Report” feature.

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