Users are fleeing the messaging app WhatsApp after announcing that it will start sharing certain usage data with parent company Facebook. The company has responded that it will delay the update as millions of users have moved to competitive services Signal and Telegram, the first of which is doing so well that its app is experiencing loading issues in light of the new usage.
The changes will only take place now and May 2021.
Return on investment – It is striking, but not surprising, that it is only a delay, rather than a reversal. Facebook is not a non-profit organization or a charity; it does not buy any company without the intention of eventually making money from it. And at a whopping $ 19 billion, WhatsApp remains Facebook’s biggest acquisition to date – one that has yet to turn it into a money printing machine.
WhatsApp does not display ads, and after its acquisition by Facebook in 2014, the app removed the $ 1 fee it had levied since ancient times. Early last year, WhatsApp canceled an initiative to include ads in the messaging app.
A Facebook account is not required to use WhatsApp, but when the update is launched, users must agree to give Facebook access to metadata, including IP addresses, user location, battery level and IMEI numbers, or the permanent identifier associated with a smartphone.
“Trust us” – WhatsApp has defended and tried to emphasize that Facebook cannot read the communications of users, nor does it keep a log of location data or private messages. But Facebook was not clear what he wanted to use the collected metadata for. It could possibly be used to target users in ads. User data collected by Facebook has been misused in the past, such as hiding housing ads for users in poorer locations or targeting political ads to discourage certain demographics from voting.
Deja vu – The change in WhatsApp’s policy certainly comes as a slap in the face to the creators of the app, who built the app with strict privacy ideals in mind and a contempt for targeted ads. Both co-founders left Facebook after the autonomy once promised to retain the mission app’s mission disappeared. But then again they sell to Facebook – they certainly knew that this outcome was anything but inevitable.
After his departure, co-founder Brian Acton appealed to the public to #deletefacebook, donating $ 50 million to WhatsApp rival Signal, which operates as a non-profit enterprise so it never has to to compromise on its privacy-friendly mission.
Another Instagram – The same fate befell Facebook’s other crown jewel, Instagram. CEO Mark Zuckerberg promised his leaders full autonomy, just to avoid control because Facebook wanted to integrate the app with the main platform and fill the app with as many advertising opportunities as possible. Instagram accounted for a third of Facebook’s revenue in 2019, showing that the $ 1 billion acquisition paid off in a jiffy, though many users felt the app had gotten worse over the years.
But WhatsApp users are very focused on focusing on privacy, and joining a company that is synonymous with the opposite is perhaps not a challenge that Facebook can overcome, no matter how much reassurance it offers.
Facebook has tried to carefully integrate its various apps by making it possible to cross users between them so that, for example, an Instagram user can send someone on Facebook Messenger. Some believe the company is building these integrations to argue regulators that it would be too difficult to break it down into any antitrust decision.
The company undoubtedly hopes that the deadline for changing data issuance to May will mean that users will stop flying, continue to use the service and eventually agree to the changes. In the meantime, we will continue to encourage our friends to put it off for Signal.