WhatsApp Pushed Back its Privacy Policy Update for This Reason

With confusion and backlash over Facebook data sharing, messenger service WhatsApp has delayed a privacy update and rescheduled it for February 8th to May 15th.

The private update was related specifically to features that allow users to message and interact with businesses on the messaging platform.

According to the company, the private updates had caused “confusion” and many users understood it to mean that the app would share more data, including messages with Facebook.

“We’ve heard from so many people how much confusion there is around our recent update. There’s been a lot of misinformation causing concern and we want to help everyone understand our principles and the facts,” WhatsApp said in a blog post this past weekend.

It was in 2020 that Facebook said businesses using WhatsApp could store and manage their chats with customers using Facebook’s “secure hosting infrastructure.”

Businesses can see the contents of the message between it and a user and may use that information for its own marketing purposes, which could include advertising on Facebook.
Contents however of messages cannot be viewed by WhatsApp or Facebook as they are encrypted.

The company’s full blog post reads as follows:

We’ve heard from so many people how much confusion there is around our recent update. There’s been a lot of misinformation causing concern and we want to help everyone understand our principles and the facts.

WhatsApp was built on a simple idea: what you share with your friends and family stays between you. This means we will always protect your personal conversations with end-to-end encryption, so that neither WhatsApp nor Facebook can see these private messages.

It’s why we don’t keep logs of who everyone’s messaging or calling. We also can’t see your shared location and we don’t share your contacts with Facebook.

With these updates, none of that is changing. Instead, the update includes new options people will have to message a business on WhatsApp, and provides further transparency about how we collect and use data. While not everyone shops with a business on WhatsApp today, we think that more people will choose to do so in the future and it’s important people are aware of these services. This update does not expand our ability to share data with Facebook.

We’re now moving back the date on which people will be asked to review and accept the terms. No one will have their account suspended or deleted on February 8. We’re also going to do a lot more to clear up the misinformation around how privacy and security works on WhatsApp. We’ll then go to people gradually to review the policy at their own pace before new business options are available on May 15.

WhatsApp helped bring end-to-end encryption to people across the world and we are committed to defending this security technology now and in the future. Thank you to everyone who has reached out to us and to so many who have helped spread facts and stop rumors. We will continue to put everything we have into making WhatsApp the best way to communicate privately.

Disclaimer: We have no position in any of the companies mentioned and have not been compensated for this article.