For months now, WhatsApp has been notifying users about the change in its privacy policy. Apparently, the Facebook-owned instant messaging app WhatsApp even said that they will hold some of the features on the app as ransom until the user doesn’t accept the updated privacy policy. Cut to now, WhatsApp seems to have a change of heart and now, it has released attempts to force users to sign up for the new privacy policy.
WhatsApp updated its privacy policy with its original plan being users would eventually lose access to the application and nothing will be immediate. The app will send out reminders to users to allow the new privacy policy before discounting on the features available. In fact, users would have nothing to use over a period of a few weeks if they continue to hold out against the new policies.
The instant messaging app has maintained that it won’t delete accounts but it does have a 120-days no-activity account deletion policy in place. However, WhatsApp has now changed its mind and it can be easily seen in the current privacy policy page and Internet Archive edition.
What the new privacy policy states are that WhatsApp won’t try to reduce the number of functionalities if the users hold out against the changes. The support page clearly states that there are no plans to impose such punishment on users who deny accepting the policy.
Note that WhatsApp has maintained that it will still send out constant reminders to users to accept the updated privacy policies from time to time. Also, they will get the notification when trying some of the functions such as pairing business from Facebook and so on.
WhatsApp has received a lot of backlash from its rivals such as Signal and Telegram as well as countries that are contesting against the change in privacy policies including India, Turkey, and Germany. Perhaps the support page mentions that a majority of users have already agreed to the new privacy policies and that reminding remaining users to sign up isn’t worth a PR backlash.
