Amid ongoing concerns about its new privacy policy posted a few days ago, WhatsApp on Tuesday I had to clarify Again, the policy does not change anything for those friends and family who send messages. He also clarified that, under some conditions, commercial messages, “different from messages with your family or friends”, can be read by Facebook and can be used for marketing purposes.
The last clarification introduces what appears to be a differentiation between “messages with friends or family” and “messages with a company”. It says that the new privacy policy applies only to the latter and the former remains unchanged.
What does that mean for someone who uses WhatsApp just to chat with friends and family?
🔴Neither WhatsApp nor Facebook can “see your private messages or listen to your calls”. Personal messages are protected by end-to-end encryption and will continue to be.
🔴WhatsApp does not keep records of who someone is texting or calling, because it considers such a data dump a “privacy and security risk”.
🔴WhatsApp cannot see a location that you have shared with a friend as it is also protected by end-to-end encryption.
🔴WhatsApp does not share a user’s contacts with Facebook or any other application.
🔴 No group data will be shared with Facebook for advertising purposes and all communication within is end-to-end encrypted. So if you are a member of an office, RWA, or school group, there is nothing to worry about as nothing changes for you.
What you get in WhatsAPp, other apps
How are commercial messages different?
The interaction between WhatsApp and Facebook, its parent company, becomes more visible when it comes to messages to companies, where the new privacy changes have been applied.
WhatsApp has clarified that some “large companies” may need to use “secure Facebook hosting services to manage WhatsApp chats with their customers, answer questions and send useful information such as purchase receipts.”
And “whether you contact a business by phone, email or WhatsApp, they can see what you are saying and can use that information for their own marketing purposes, which may include advertising on Facebook.” But WhatsApp says it will “clearly label conversations with businesses that choose to use Facebook’s hosting services.”
These tags are already visible when you communicate with a business, and users will now have to decide if they want to participate in a conversation, the details of which could be used to show them targeted ads. Using the Stores features on WhatsApp could also open your preferences for targeted ads on other Facebook products such as Instagram. So clearly, business messaging, which WhatsApp has been gradually rolling out in many markets, will ultimately result in ads based on the preferences that you have shown to the business.
If you use WhatsApp for a business and you have a customer list, the business on the other side will also see the conversation and know your preferences. This could be used to show you ads on Facebook platforms. If you are the business owner, you could use some of the insights to run targeted ads to your customers on Facebook and other services.
What changes for you in these scenarios?
IF YOU ARE ON FACEBOOK: Nothing changes when it comes to personal chats. However, if you have conversations with a business, you may start to see related ads on Facebook and other business products, such as Instagram.
… OR IF IT IS NOT: Nothing changes for you as a WhatsApp user, as no ads can be shown to you on Facebook.
IF YOU HAVE A GREAT FOLLOWING: WhatsApp remains a secure platform for all your personal conversations with individuals and groups. However, it might be a good idea to be careful when using business functions, as many people may have access to your preferences.
… OR IF IT DOESN’T: Your regular WhatsApp conversations remain secure and end-to-end encrypted.
Do my Facebook friends know what my WhatsApp contacts send me?
No. Your conversations are encrypted and neither WhatsApp nor Facebook can see what is being talked about. This also applies to all of your groups.
What countries have a different policy?
While data is shared with Facebook even in the European Union, users get more control. That’s because the EU has a different privacy policy on any software product compared to the rest of the world. General EU data
The Protection Regulation (GDPR) is one of the strictest in the world and ensures that consumers have all rights to their data and how it is processed, and may even demand the erasure of the information.
According to WhatsApp’s own policy for the EU, consumers have “the right to access, rectify, port and delete their information, as well as the right to restrict and oppose certain processing of their information.”
While WhatsApp’s privacy policy in the EU also talks about the exchange of data with Facebook, consumers get a special setting called “Management and retention of their information”, with which they can rectify, update or delete the information they control the platform. This option is not available elsewhere. EU consumers can even withdraw their consent to WhatsApp for data processing, thanks to GDPR.
Interestingly, after the EU antitrust authorities in 2017 fined Facebook 110 million euros for misleading regulators during a review of the WhatsApp acquisition in 2014, the social network had told these regulators that it was technically not possible to combine WhatsApp data with your other services.
So why doesn’t India have such an extensive controls scenario?
India lacks a regulatory authority. Until the personal data protection bill becomes law, it will be difficult to keep an eye on tech companies on how user data should be processed.
WhatsApp’s new privacy policy applies to all countries, including the US, and users will need to agree to the terms and conditions to continue using the service.
How does the update read in the context of the regulatory scrutiny Facebook faces in the US and the EU?
Regulatory heat makes the timing of this update interesting. In the US, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has filed a lawsuit against Facebook for antitrust and anti-competitive policies. It has also put the acquisition of WhatsApp and Instagram by Facebook under the scanner.
These two apps have helped Facebook dominate the social media and messaging space in the last five years. If the FTC wins its cases, it wants Facebook to sell both WhatsApp and Instagram, which could prove disastrous for the company.
In addition, it would mean that Zuckerberg’s vision of interoperability among other applications in the industry would come to an end. In their scheme of things, a WhatsApp user should be able to message someone on Messenger, even if they don’t use that app. This interoperability will be limited to Facebook’s own suite of products.
The EU is also investigating Facebook for claims that it trampled on the competition with the help of large amounts of user data. The company has resisted the EU’s demands for various documents and also filed a lawsuit against it this past year.
📣 JOIN NOW 📣: The Telegram channel Explained Express
Should I stay on WhatsApp or migrate to another application?
No need to exit WhatsApp if you use it primarily to communicate with friends and family. However, it seems that an exodus is taking place. Signal tops Apple’s App Store charts and appears to be driven by downloads from India, according to a tweet from the company.
Signal also offers end-to-end (E2E) encryption, similar to WhatsApp, but run by a non-profit organization co-founded by WhatsApp founder Brian Acton. Signal’s E2E protocol is actually used by WhatsApp. It has a number of features that WhatsApp offers, but some, like group video calls, are still in the beta stage. It also lacks some of the conveniences that WhatsApp offers, such as the ability to back up all your chats to a third-party service, such as Google Drive or iCloud, or the ability to connect to business accounts.
Another encrypted messaging application is Telegram, created by Russian brothers Nikolai and Pavel Durov, with characteristics similar to WhatsApp. It is more evolved than Signal because it has been around since 2013. Telegram groups can be made visible to everyone or kept private.
The biggest advantage of WhatsApp is that it is ubiquitous and everyone on your contact list is using it. In Signal, even now, you have to find users to chat with. But the app will make sense if a whole group decides to move the conversations there. If you are thinking of quitting WhatsApp but are still using Facebook products like Messenger, Instagram and Facebook itself, then the exercise will be meaningless.
The WhatsApp policy update has raised several concerns. Following the clarifications of WhatsApp, many of these concerns are unfounded:
Does WhatsApp now share my messages with Facebook?
No, the messages will remain end-to-end encrypted and even WhatsApp will not be able to see them. WhatsApp boss Will Cathcart tweeted: “We are committed to this technology and committed to championing it globally.”
Does WhatsApp share my location with Facebook?
Only approximate location information based on tower or IP, not live locations shared between users.
Does WhatsApp now own the content I have shared?
No. Anyway, all media are end-to-end encrypted and cannot be viewed or used by WhatsApp. It is also not stored after a message has been delivered.
Will WhatsApp show ads?
Not right now. If WhatsApp changes this, there will be another update to the privacy policy.
Will WhatsApp record and track my audio / video calls?
No. Again, all conversations and encrypted between the parties involved.
– Chetan Nayak
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