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- WhatsApp’s new policy on sharing data with Facebook has affected many of its users.
- Experts told Insider that while the app won’t share message content, it will share who, where, and when you talk to people.
- All of them recommended that users switch to Signal, a smaller, encrypted messaging app because it is “highly reliable.”
- Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.
After a change to its terms of service raised privacy concerns among users, WhatsApp clarified on Monday that its new policy does not affect the privacy of messages from people with friends or family.
The messaging app, which markets itself as a privacy-focused service, will force its users next month to agree to let Facebook and its affiliates collect their personal data on WhatsApp, including phone numbers and locations.
If users do not agree to the new terms and conditions by February 8, they will be kicked from the app.
WhatsApp said in a statement Monday that it wants to respond to “rumors circulating,” saying the policy update, which takes effect on February 8, “does not in any way affect the privacy of your messages with your friends or family”.
This then led to WhatsApp rivals Signal and Telegram to see millions of users flock to their apps. On Wednesday, they reached # 1 on the Google and Apple app stores, and Signal got Elon Musk’s endorsement with a Tweeter: “Use signal.”
So, should WhatsApp users really be worried about these new privacy changes?
Experts told Insider that WhatsApp will not share any message content because it is decrypted. But the app will be able to access metadata – in other words, who is sending a message to whom, when, and from where.
Alan Woodword, a computer scientist at the University of Surrey, told Insider that the mere fact that WhatsApp shares personal data with Facebook is concerning because “Facebook openly says its business model is to use user data for profit. “.
Woodword, who prefers to use Signal over WhatsApp, said he was surprised when he saw the news, as Facebook said it would not be collecting data from WhatsApp when the messaging app took over in 2014.
Users can just stay with WhatsApp because of its fan base
While privacy-conscious people are most likely turning to apps like Signal, Woodword believes that “there are enough WhatsApp users out there that you will probably have to keep using it to stay in touch with. them”.
He also suspects that users will stay with WhatsApp because they “will accept the social contract with Facebook that they can use the platform as long as they share data in exchange for it being free.”
Professor Eerke Boiten, director of the institute for cyber technology at De Montfort University in Leicester, told Insider that giving users an ultimatum on agreeing to the new terms was “the worst thing WhatsApp has done” .
It probably mistreated a lot of people, he said.
WhatsApp’s promise to only let the policy affect messages sent to work accounts is “potentially a more limited privacy breach,” according to Boiten. But it depends on whether Facebook “retains control over this method of access.”
Boiten said he expects data, especially contacts and communication metadata, to be shared “anytime, anywhere. [Facebook and WhatsApp] can get away with it. ”
The signal is “ highly reliable ”
Boiten and Woodword both said they would recommend users switch to safer alternative messaging apps. “Signal is highly reliable,” Boiten said, adding that Telegram had also “improved its game” in the area of encryption.
Wolfie Christl, researcher and privacy advocate at Cracked Labs, also joins the chorus of WhatsApp critics who recommend users switch to Signal. His reasoning is that the app is “operated by a non-profit organization and its source code is publicly available for people to review.”
The week starting January 4, Signal recorded 7.5 million downloads, an increase of 4,200% over the previous week. Telegram saw 9 million downloads, an increase of 91%.
“The more people join these services, the more secure people who really need such services become,” Boiten added.
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