Time to hit the uninstall button
Users should part ways with WhatsApp because of its new privacy policy, writes David Court.
If you’re a WhatsApp user, you may have noticed a pop-up appearing in the app this past week, detailing its new privacy policy. It’s not good news.
Users have until May 16 to accept the terms, or lose access to WhatsApp (originally the date was February 8, but Facebook extended the deadline due to too much confusion).
The new agreement informs users that WhatsApp will reserve the right to share users’ phone numbers, IP addresses and payment info with the rest of the Facebook group. And users who communicate with a business via WhatsApp can also have their data used to target them with relevant ads on Facebook.
And though the policy changes only apply to WhatsApp interactions with businesses, there are lots of users who are very unhappy about the move.
Most notably, Elon Musk took to Twitter to urge his 42.6 million followers to dump the Facebookowned messaging app and download Signal instead, citing privacy reasons.
Rival end-to-end encrypted messaging apps, Signal and Telegram, both topped Apple and Google’s free app download charts over the past week.
Facebook clearly has another big problem here. It’s an advertising company that is trying to monetise a private messaging platform that has always marketed itself as being ad-free private.
In fact, before Facebook bought WhatsApp, for an eye-wateringly large amount of money, 100 per cent of its users were paying customers – seemingly happy to pay the US$1 annual subscription fee for a messaging environment not littered with ads.
When WhatsApp removed the US$1 fee, it released a blog post detailing its decision, stating: ‘‘People might wonder how we plan to keep WhatsApp running without subscription fees and if today’s announcement means we’re introducing thirdparty ads. The answer is no.’’
The post went on to say: ‘‘Starting this year, we will test tools that allow you to use WhatsApp to communicate with
It’s time we heed Elon Musk’s advice (for once) and start convincing friends and family to migrate over to Signal and drop WhatsApp asap.
businesses and organisations that you want to hear from.’’
And now it looks like these are the very tools that users are being forced to accept.
The problem is compounded by the amount of money Facebook paid for WhatsApp in February 2014. A whopping US$19.6 billion (NZ$27.2b) – $4b in cash and $12b remaining in Facebook shares. Plus a further US$3.6b as compensation to WhatsApp employees for migrating to Facebook.
That means the total price Facebook paid was US$21.8b. Or, more importantly, US$55 a user. I’d love to know what Mark Zuckerberg was thinking at the time, as the rationale behind the purchase still confuses to me.
WhatsApp only managed to generate US$15.9 million in revenue in the first half of 2014. The general consensus suggests that Facebook bought WhatsApp because of one reason, growth.
In 2014, WhatApp had more than 500 million active users, with the service adding more than one million users a day. Reports suggest that 70 per cent of WhatsApps users were using the messaging service daily – outperforming Facebook’s figure of 62 per cent.
And while WhatsApp users were outperforming Facebook users in 2014 – sharing 500 million images a day compared to Facebook’s 150 million – US$21.8b is still a huge price to pay to protect your lead as a business.
Today, WhatsApp has more than 1.5 billion users, and it’s totally free to use. Some industry commentators suggest WhatsApp was Facebook’s way of accessing users around the world, where connectivity isn’t strong enough for users to enjoy the full-fat Facebook advertising experience, but still good enough to post strong user engagement numbers.
The confusing thing has always been how, or even if, Facebook planned on monetising WhatsApp.
As far as I can see, there’s no obvious way to turn an industry like private messaging with end-toend encryption, into a moneymaker without making users pay directly (for their privacy), or somehow introduce inapp advertising and hope it doesn’t drive users away.
One thing is for sure, WhatsApp as we know it is about to change.
Facebook is going to push businesses on to the platform. I suspect it’s going to look a bit more like China’s dominant WeChat service, where browsing and shopping from sellers are possible in-app.
The problem Facebook has is that a lot of its users don’t trust it as a company. And there are several alternatives to WhatsApp out there already, just waiting to capitalise. Signal and Telegram both offer secure end-to-end messaging and users can migrate en-mass to these apps within days and not experience any real loss of features.
It’s time we heed Elon Musk’s advice (for once) and start convincing friends and family to migrate over to Signal and drop WhatsApp asap.
Easier said than done, though.