Several fantasy stock trading apps have been received legal notices to stop using NSE Data and Analytics Ltd’s data for virtual gaming platforms that rely on real-time share movements.

A copy of the notice seen by YourStory indicates that NSE Data, a unit of the National Stock Exchange of India Ltd, is also seeking damages for infringement of its intellectual property rights, loss of revenue and reputation.

NSE Data in the notice says, “…you are disseminating data deceptively similar to the real time Data belonging to NSE Data, to your users on a commercial basis, for virtual trading, gaming and simulation and misrepresenting that you are authorized by NSE data to use this data on your website or mobile application.”

According to an anonymous NSE executive, the exchange was willing to provide the data to startup firms for educational purposes without any charge but those companies could not use the data for charging users for gaming or competitions.

“A lot of apps are running under the garb of being an educational platform. But at the end of the day, they all are making money via betting, gambling, predictions, creating pools, and so on, that is one of the reasons why they do not source data from authorized sources. No one has done the paperwork,” the NSE executive added.

As per NSE Data all the firms are required to disclose the names of entities from which they received access to the data and compensate for illegal profits earned and accrued for the duration of the wrongful use of the data.

Currently, NSE has not replied to the email from YourStory asking for comments and details on the companies involved. Ztocks, Bullspree, Threedots, Stockgro, Stockz11, Stocktry, and Dstreet Finance have also not responded to the queries. Failure to comply with the notice will lead to civil/criminal proceedings.

According to a Dream11 spokesperson, the company’s Investro platform is merely an “educational app” which is at a beta stage of launch, but declined to comment if it had also received a notice from NSE Data.