WhatsApp Postpones Date By Which Users Must Agree to New Terms

By Yehudit Garmaise

 After millions of WhatsApp users made hasty retreats to other messaging services after the Facebook-owned app forced its 2 billion users to agree to a new “privacy policy” by Feb. 8, today WhatsApp pushed back that date to May 15, so that users have several months to “gradually review the [new] policy.”

    In what will probably be remembered as one of the worst rollouts ever, on Jan. 4, WhatsApp users received an unclear text that said that unless they agreed to the messaging systems’ updated terms of by Feb. 8, users’ accounts would be suspended or deleted.

     WhatsApp did not make its new terms of use clear, which led many users to feel that their privacy was being compromised.

   Rumors abounded that to further monetize its service, WhatsApp would be sharing users’ posts, contacts, and data with Facebook, Instagram, and maybe other social media sites, even when users did not have accounts with those sites.

   Today, WhatsApp either backpedaled or clarified its new policies by posting that its commitment to users’ privacy would not be changing.

    Because WhatsApp users could not be more confused about what the messaging system aims to do with their data, WhatsApp said that it wants to “provide further transparency about how we collect and use data.” 

     For instance, WhatsApp said, “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.”

    WhatsApp explained that what will be new this year “new options for messaging businesses,” without explaining exactly what those options are.

   WhatsApp did say that its “update does not expand our ability to share data with Facebook.”

   “We're also going to do a lot more to clear up the misinformation around how privacy and security works on WhatsApp.”