#WHO OWNS WHATSAPP 2021 UPDATE#

“We have been raising concerns about WhatsApp for six years, so the fact that people are now taking it seriously and reacting to it is amazing,” said Bishakha Datta, a digital rights activist and founder of non-profit organisation Point of View. In India, the unprecedented change in attitude towards the app is evident from the fact that older users like Patel are also considering migrating away from WhatsApp. While most users of digital platforms agree to terms, conditions and privacy policies without actually reading them, WhatsApp’s latest policy has, for the first time, sparked a mass exodus towards other messenger platforms. More significantly, the privacy policy confirms that WhatsApp will allow Facebook access to messages that users share with businesses on the messenger app, which will enable Facebook to further influence user behaviour through targeted advertising. The policy makes it clear that WhatsApp collects expansive meta data from users’ phones, including internet protocol addresses and phone number area codes to estimate users’ geographical location. The new WhatsApp notification forces users to accept its updated privacy policy by February 8 in order to continue using the app. But a new WhatsApp privacy policy released on January 4 has triggered widespread, global alarm about the safety of user data. Telegram, another messenger app, has also seen a surge in new users, with 1.7 million downloads since January 1.Ĭoncerns about data privacy with respect to WhatsApp are not new – the app has run into controversies about user data shared with its parent company, Facebook, ever since it was acquired by Facebook Inc in 2014. Patel is not alone – she is one of 1.2 million people who have downloaded Signal since the start of 2021, at the same time that WhatsApp saw an 11% decline in its weekly downloads. “I had never heard of Signal, but my own son said he has shifted to it, so I asked him to put it on my phone.” “All weekend, my friends had been forwarding messages from their children about how WhatsApp is taking private data from our phones,” said Patel, a retired bank clerk from Mumbai. Since Saturday, however, she has spent hours glued to her phone, struggling to familiarise herself with Signal – a messenger app to which many in her “school friends” WhatsApp group were moving. Up till a week ago, 67-year-old Snehlata Patel believed that WhatsApp was the only possible way in which she could share jokes and other messages with her friends, or have “free” video calls with her relatives.

#WHO OWNS WHATSAPP 2021 UPDATE#

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Who owns whatsapp 2021