Facebook's acquisition of WhatsApp user data questioned
ConsumerAffairs' founder and former editor, Jim Hood formerly headed Associated Press Broadcast News, directing coverage of major news events worldwide.He also served as Senior Vice President of United Press International and was the founder and editor of Zapnews, a newswire service for radio and television.Read Full Bio→Facebook's $19 billion acquisition of WhatsApp included a lot more than just WhatsApp's business and technology platform.
This is how you stop WhatsApp from sharing your data with Facebook
WhatsApp hasn't updated its Terms of Service in four years, but the latest changes are making users of the app a little uneasy.Your info is now being shared with Facebook for a number of reasons, including showing you more relevant ads.But if this makes you uncomfortable, then there's an easy way to opt out.
How to stop WhatsApp from sharing your data with Facebook
Rose Behar August 31, 2016 8:50amIn a move that outraged many of its users, WhatsApp recently updated its terms of service to begin sharing a limited amount of user data with Facebook."By coordinating more with Facebook, we'll be able to do things like track basic metrics regarding how often people use our services and better fight spam on WhatsApp," said the company in a blog post, adding that by connecting a phone number, the social media platform can offer better friend suggestions and show more relevant ads.While the messaging app's post portrays the change as only beneficial to users, it seems at odds with its long-held and often stringent commitment to privacy, as evidenced by a blog post from 2014 when the company was acquired by Facebook.
WhatsApp met with backlash after giving users' data to Facebook
WhatsApp and Facebook have come under fire after the messaging app announced an update to its privacy policy that gives it permission to share its users' phone numbers, device information and metadata with the social network, its parent company.The new terms have sparked outrage among privacy conscious users, given the messaging service's traditional commitment to privacy and promise not to compromise this when it was bought by Facebook two years ago.Some users who don't want their accounts on the separate apps to be linked in anyway have decided to delete the app in favour of secure apps, such as Telegram and Signal.
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