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- WhatsApp’s controversial privacy policy updates will not roll out as planned, the company said today.
- Instead, the company will suspend the deployment for at least three months.
- This change of plans is most likely the result of intense user reaction to the changes.
Today, in an official blog post, WhatsApp announced that it will press “pause” on controversial updates to its privacy policies. The company said it wanted more time to “remove misinformation about how privacy and security works on WhatsApp.”
The delay will last at least three months. However, there are no plans to make any changes to the policy during this period.
WhatsApp is in a big mess
The move is a direct response to the not-so-subtle user backlash associated with policy changes. Essentially, WhatsApp’s new privacy terms allow the company to retrieve specific user data from WhatsApp and transfer it to other properties owned by Facebook, including the social network of the same name.
Related: This is how WhatsApp will share your data with other Facebook brands
When the privacy policy changes were made public last week, the public response was downright brutal. It has initiated a huge exodus of WhatsApp users to other encrypted messaging platforms, including Telegram and Signal. In the latter’s case, its servers crashed earlier today in part due to the huge growth in user numbers.
In the blog post, the company claims that none of its privacy-focused features are changing. He explains that this new policy is aimed at helping users connect with businesses, which he says is something few users are doing right now. However, it sees this as the future of its platform and is ready to take that leap even if its users are not.
In a survey conducted here at Android Authority, only around 10% of our readers said they agreed with the changes to WhatsApp’s privacy policy. If you want to delete your WhatsApp account, we have step by step instructions here.
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