The Achilles heel of Meta and its applications has always been user privacy. The treatment that Facebook has done for years of its users’ data has been controversial to say the least, and that has affected the image of WhatsApp and Instagram, the company’s other two prominent applications. These are the new features of WhatsApp that will reinforce your privacy in three different ways, giving you greater control of your conversations and greater protection while using this instant messaging service.
LEAVE WHATSAPP GROUPS SILENTLY
It is quite rare to meet someone who has not felt rushed to leave a group . The fact that when leaving him a message appeared in the conversation indicating his departure has caused many to stay in groups in which they never felt comfortable for a long time, and although he himself was muted, it is evident that this was an inconvenience.
WhatsApp has decided to tackle this discomfort at the root and will now allow its users to leave a group in a much more discreet way. With this new modification in privacy, the notification of your leaving the group will only reach the administrators of the same . The novelty will arrive in the next WhatsApp updates, with the forecast that all users can do it this month. In case you still cannot leave it in this way, it will be a matter of time.
SELECTION OF USERS WHO SEE THE STATUS ONLINE IN WHATSAPP
Another measure highly demanded by WhatsApp users was the all or nothing that they were forced to do when it came to hiding or not their online status . This option, which is usually activated to avoid prying eyes from bosses, co-workers or specific family members, could only be used if this information was vetoed for everyone.
Future WhatsApp updates will already start to have this much more customizable feature . From now on, we can keep our activity in the application private by selecting those contacts from whom we want to hide our online status, and not all of them.
BLOCK SCREENSHOTS FOR TEMPORARY MESSAGES ON WHATSAPP
The third novelty that will reinforce the privacy of the user in WhatsApp and will protect it much more will be the impossibility of capturing the screen when we launch a temporary message . This tool allows you to send messages that you don’t want to last and that are consumed in a short space of time, as well as photographs. However, many users wanted to bypass its temporary nature and ended up capturing the message or image without the sender’s consent, which violated their privacy.
This new feature may take longer to be fully adopted by all WhatsApp users, as it is still in the testing phase. However, this extra layer of protection will be a great addition and will give users more confidence when using temporary messages within the app.
In recent years, improvements in WhatsApp privacy have been constant, and these three new additions to the application settings will join others such as end-to-end encryption or the ability to block and report other users. Although it is the leading instant messaging application, Mark Zuckerberg is aware that it still has a lot of room for improvement compared to other alternatives that prioritize user privacy even more, such as Telegram or Signal.