WhatsApp announced on Friday that the confidentiality of a new three-month privacy policy would originally take effect on February 8 after much confusion over whether the new policy would require sharing data with Facebook.
The update does not affect the sharing of data with Facebook regarding user chats or other profile information; WhatsApp has repeatedly highlighted that the update addresses business chats if a user talks to a business’s customer service platform via WhatsApp.
‘We’ve heard from so many people how much confusion there is about our recent update. There was a lot of misinformation that is causing concern and we want to help everyone understand our principles and facts, ‘the company wrote in a new blog post published today.
Since 2016, WhatsApp has shared certain information with Facebook, including your phone number, unless you were one of the few users who chose to share for data sharing while the option was still available that year. However, WhatsApp does not look at people’s chat messages or listen to their calls, and WhatsApp conversations are end-to-end encrypted to protect against the abuse.
Despite this, it contains a pop-up that notifies users of the new change, stating how WhatsApp partners with Facebook, and it also includes an ultimatum instructing users to delete their account if they choose to not agreeing to the new provisions. It gave people the idea that they were tracking in a new, more penetrating way.
The company published a separate blog post this week to clear up the confusion, and it contains a graph specifying what information is protected and not shared when someone uses WhatsApp.
But numerous media reports emphasizing the addition of a new, broad language in the privacy policy (which according to WhatsApp was misinterpreted as an obligation to share data) and misinformation on social media have combined into a complete WhatsApp privacy view. The result was an increase in notifications for competing competitors such as Signal and Telegram.
Facebook executives, including Instagram chief Adam Mosseri and WhatsApp chief Will Cathcart, used Twitter to clear up the confusion, it seems with little success. Facebook’s poor privacy record and the fact that over time WhatsApp turned its sights on the platform for its large international user base weakened confidence in the chat app, which in turn had the effect of a relatively mundane effect. . working up in a global controversy.
WhatsApp says it will use this three-month delay to better communicate the changes in its new policies and its long-standing privacy practices regarding personal conversations, location and other sensitive data. “We are now moving back the date on which people are asked to review and accept the terms,” reads the blog post.
WhatsApp says no one will lose access to the app if they do not agree to the new terms of service that announced the changes earlier this month. “We are also going to do a lot more to clear up the wrong information about how privacy and security work on WhatsApp. We will then gradually go to people to review the policy at their own pace before new business options become available on 15 May, ”the company says.
WhatsApp tells The edge the policy will not change if it comes out. The purpose of the update is to communicate to users that messages with businesses can be stored on WhatsApp on Facebook servers, necessitating the exchange of data between the two companies and that Facebook can share the information between its main social network and Instagram for advertising target and improve its digital commerce. WhatsApp is still planning to launch the update on May 15 to coincide with new features for business chat that it started previewing in October.
But the company hopes the extra time it will help deal with the controversy and improve its messages on what is actually changing.
‘The update includes new options that should alert people to a business on WhatsApp and provides further transparency about how we collect and use data. “Although not everyone does business on WhatsApp today, we think more people will choose it in the future, and it’s important that people are aware of these services, ‘reads the blog post. “This update does not extend our ability to share data with Facebook.”