Now we could easily see that WhatsApp collects the contacts in your phone, commercial data where you use Facebook services, device-based identifiers, your IP address which provides your location unless you’re using a VPN, and your usage logs. Suddenly, those concerns around WhatsApp metadata collection became more real.
The issue for WhatsApp is that when you claim security and privacy is in your DNA, you open yourself up to a heightened level of scrutiny. Facebook led this charge, taking out full-page ads to argue against Apple’s move. “On each app’s product page,” Apple explains, “users can learn about some of the data types an app may collect, and whether that data is linked to them or used to track them.” These labels launched last month and caused a furore between Apple and app developers whose data collecting practices were now heavily exposed. Apple’s stunning response to this undercurrent of metadata collection has been its privacy labels, now live on the App Store.
For example, when other users you know use our services, they may provide your phone number from their mobile address book (just as you may provide theirs), or they may send you a message, send messages to groups to which you belong, or call you.” As WhatsApp says, its metadata “includes information about your activity… device-specific information… such as hardware model, operating system information, browser information, IP address, mobile network information including phone number, and device identifiers… We receive information other people provide us, which may include information about you. If I can link you to various apps by your personal identifiers, your phone number or device ID for example, then I can tie your metadata to everything else I know. And the reason there’s now a messaging war for users is that these are the stickiest apps around. Tracking and cross-referencing browsing and social media activity is one thing, but what you do within the confines of apps is different-there you’re a captive audience. As my colleague Kate O’Flaherty explained at the time, this is a genuine “ game-changer” for user privacy-cutting the tracking IDs and location mapping relied on by advertisers. “Facebook may use information from us to improve your experiences within their services such as making product suggestions (for example, of friends or connections, or of interesting content) and showing relevant offers and ads.”Ĭue Apple and its campaign to curb Facebook’s insatiable appetite for its users’ data. And while your end-to-end encrypted content cannot be accessed, “your WhatsApp messages will not be shared onto Facebook for others to see,” it confirms, there is that metadata.
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