Two years after WhatsApp, one of the biggest mobile messenger applications in the world, was acquired by Facebook, they said they will start sharing user information with the social media channel.
“Today, we’re updating WhatsApp’s terms and privacy policy for the first time in four years, as part of our plans to test ways for people to communicate with businesses in the months ahead. The updated documents also reflect that we’ve joined Facebook,” The application stated in a blog post.
According to WhatsApp, the updated terms and conditions will allow them to better analyse user’s behaviour, fight spam and create friend suggestions. The user info shared with Facebook includes phone numbers and analytical data. In the blog post, they emphasised that information will not be sold to advertisers.
WhatsApp will also not be able to read your messages. “Even as we coordinate more with Facebook in the months ahead, your encrypted messages stay private and no one else can read them. Not WhatsApp, not Facebook, nor anyone else. We won’t post or share your WhatsApp number with others, including on Facebook, and we still won’t sell, share, or give your phone number to advertisers.”
The news was received with concern by a lot of users, many of whom liked the app for their anonymity. People who have been hesitant to give their phone number to Facebook now don’t seem to have a choice.
If you really don’t want WhatsApp to share your info with Facebook, you can still opt out. Head to the app’s settings menu, and then press the account tab. From there, you can uncheck the box reading ‘Share my account info’ to stop providing Facebook with your user data.
