WhatsApp to cut off Irish users if they don’t agree to more interaction with Faceboo

iamstop

https://www.independent.ie/business/technology/whatsapp-to-cut-off-irish-users-if-they-dont-agree-to-more-interaction-with-facebook-and-local-businesses-40418040.html

Time to switch to Signal en mass, call their bluff.

bassy

faceboo is that new

biddyearley

Time to delete the app.



What other messaging app can anyone recommend?

biko

Telegram and Signal.
There are more out there.

The new rule has proved controversial across Europe. It opens it up to businesses on Facebook that want to connect WhatsApp users.
Yesterday, one of Germany’s biggest data protection regulators, Hamburg’s Johannesburg Caspar, said that it viewed the messaging app’s new terms of use as illegal.

"If the app is free you are the product being sold" has never been truer.

McMurphy

Telegram ftw anyway.

_Kaiser_

Unfortunately the reality is that most users won't care or don't read the terms and conditions anyway.. They'll just accept regardless.

Unless everyone else you talk to on WhatsApp is willing to switch too, adopting other apps won't work.

What info are they gathering?

AndrewJRenko

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

Unless everyone else you talk to on WhatsApp is willing to switch too, adopting other apps won't work.

You don't need EVERYONE to switch. Just switch to Signal and use it as your first choice. Over time, you'll find more and more people on Signal. If you don't switch, you're holding others back from switching.

Suckit

14 new contacts on signal today, in my contacts.
There will be many people who will not accept the new t&c's. There will be many (most) that will just accept and not care, but if they want to contact the other on a messenger style app, they will be forced to switch.
I haven't updates on, so I need to manually update. When whatsapp forces me to update, I won't be accepting the t&c's.
It won't bother me if I have to leave groups or contacts etc.

francois

fvp4 wrote: »

What info are they gathering?

Contacts, location, phone number, profile pic, device make type and OS level, IP addresses, who you have chatted with, if they can be linked back to your Facebook profile for starters

Telegram has even worse privacy than WhatsApp. No end-to-end encryption, and owned by a shady enough pair of Russians. Main servers located in Dubai.

Spocker

Tis all there in black and white: https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/privacy-policy?eea=0#privacy-policy-key-updates

Suckit

fvp4 wrote: »

What info are they gathering?

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/may/14/you-should-be-worried-about-how-much-info-whatsapp-shares-with-facebook

Dempo1

I feel left out, I've not had any requests to accept any new terms and conditions should I WhatsApp them

Personally I care less, I've never had a Facebook account and never will. The only thing that would force me to stop using WhatsApp is adverts.

Larbre34

Yeah, no, I've had very lightly used Facebook for about 12 years, its been useful for births deaths and marriages, but won't be missed.

Time for Facebook profile to go and FB and WA apps to be deleted.

astrofool

biko wrote: »

Telegram and Signal.
There are more out there.

"If the app is free you are the product being sold" has never been truer.

telegram and signal are also free...

SnuggyBear

Good luck getting people to move to something else. Most people don't care about privacy. I don't have a Facebook account and I'd rather not use anything made by them but I have no hope of getting friends and family to move to something else.

irishgeo

francois wrote: »

Contacts, location, phone number, profile pic, device make type and OS level, IP addresses, who you have chatted with, if they can be linked back to your Facebook profile for starters

EU law bans them from sharing user data with Facebook

Suckit

SnuggyBear wrote: »

Good luck getting people to move to something else. Most people don't care about privacy. I don't have a Facebook account and I'd rather not use anything made by them but I have no hope of getting friends and family to move to something else.

I would agree until now, but coupled with the type of publicity this has been getting in the media, especially this last week, it would be easier now than ever to convince people.
I personally for example, won't be accepting the new t&c's.
If anyone wants to contact me, it will have to be through Signal or SMS once whatsapp have stopped my last version from working.
Assuming there will be others of the same opinion, then there will more people migrating to others (right now signal seems the most popular), and that might just gather some momentum.
Last year if most people randonly switched to signal at any time, there would likely be nobody in their contacts on it. That will change and will be easier for more to move from now I suspect.

mcmoustache

irishgeo wrote: »

EU law bans them from sharing user data with Facebook

Irish law forbids me from purchasing narcotics but here we are.


Honestly, people should just take a look at the data in the recent leak and understand that in the constant battle between securing and leaking data, leaking only needs to win once.

irishgeo

mcmoustache wrote: »

Irish law forbids me from purchasing narcotics but here we are.


Honestly, people should just take a look at the data in the recent leak and understand that in the constant battle between securing and leaking data, leaking only needs to win once.

Signal could have a data leak issue too. terms says it can optionally upload your contacts to its servers and may encrypt or hash them.

Suckit

irishgeo wrote: »

Signal could have a data leak issue too. terms says it can optionally upload your contacts to its servers and may encrypt or hash them.

Realistically, they all do. Android sms is worse then whatsapp, silence only offers a relatively small layer of protection.
IIRC iMessage is the most secure of all, but not openly available on android (it is possible with a lot of faffing around but not worth it).
Until somebody comes up with a properly encrypted and secure option, using anything that is not giving your information away to FB via whatsapp is a better option.

Dempo1

Just curious is this Terms and Conditions issue only directed at people who have a Facebook account and WhatsApp account, does it affect people with just a WhatsApp account?

Spocker

It's for WhatsApp users, it doesn't matter if you have a FB account or not

Dempo1

Spocker wrote: »

It's for WhatsApp users, it doesn't matter if you have a FB account or not

Then I'm definitely being forgotten about , I've not heard a whisper, can one complain

Thanks

3DataModem

Telegram stores everything server side, including keys. Most users don't have E2E encryption, and it's not possible on desktop version. Anyone who thinks it is more secure than Whatsapp is - by most standards - wrong.

Signal is a lot better (it's what Whatsapp uses, so it must be good!) and has very strong E2E encryption.

wes

This may finally push people to use Signal.

Qiaonasen

Deleted WhatsApp in January. All family members in Ireland slowly moving when they realise they want to contact me and I am not going back. I am using signal and telegram. Have been for years. Telegram has it's flaws but I am not sure shady Russians is the main one. Telegram has refused many times to cooperate with governments the world over.



Security could be better by default. I recommend moving to matrix if anything. It is decentralise and hopefully the future. Think multiple distributed servers and clients and full open source. I'll settle for signal for now though if people bother to move.


The key in this is delete it yourself. And trust me. Your friends and family will come if they want to talk about you. You will miss nothing. Finally managed to move on from the Facebook ecosystem. Zuckerburg has no principles. The carry on he did to try and access the Chinese market was cringe inducing.

Marcos

FYI - I don't know if this has been posted before, and apologies if it has, but Whatsapp has changed it's group settings to include "everyone" by default, so people you don't know can add you to a group without your knowledge. Why I don't know, but you can be sure it's not for our benefit. It seems to make things easier for scammers and other nefarious uses.

So if you don't want to be included in groups without your knowledge.

1. Go to WhatsApp settings
2. Go to Account
3. Go to Privacy
4. Go to Groups
5. Change from Everyone to My Contacts.

Flinty997

I see that message is going out on a all of the whatsapp groups I'm on.

Suckit

Yeah, I don't think it's something they changed, it's been there a while, but handy to change it anyway.

JimmyVik

Am I the only one who couldnt give a flyin fcuk?
Most people are on whatsapp.
I downloaded signal a few months ago and i got all these messages from people in my contacts who i hadnt spoken to in years saying "welcome to signal". It must have notified them all. I uninstalled it. One IM is enough to have on your phone.

Cyclepath

3DataModem wrote: »

Telegram stores everything server side, including keys. Most users don't have E2E encryption, and it's not possible on desktop version. Anyone who thinks it is more secure than Whatsapp is - by most standards - wrong.

Signal is a lot better (it's what Whatsapp uses, so it must be good!) and has very strong E2E encryption.

Also, Signal is run as a Not for Profit organisation - along the same lines as Wikipedia. You can donate to it as a charitable cause etc.

JimmyVik

Does anyone know what info boards keeps on you?
I know they do browser fingerprinting anyway, so probably a lot.

Capt'n Midnight

irishgeo wrote: »

EU law bans them from sharing user data with Facebook

FB shows targeted ads for adults only stuff to young teenagers. Vaping, porn, gambling, tobacco and alcohol. Don't expect ethical behaviour from them.

Don't even expect compliance with legal requirements where any fines could be paid from ongoing advertising sales.

biko

Spocker wrote: »

Tis all there in black and white: https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/privacy-policy?eea=0#privacy-policy-key-updates

Better Communication With Businesses. Many businesses rely on WhatsApp to communicate with their customers and clients. We work with businesses that use Facebook or third parties to help store and better manage their communications with you on WhatsApp.

Pretty straightforward.

RobbingBandit

Facebook cut my newsfeed yesterday no more updated posts what the actual fack are they at

biko

astrofool wrote: »

telegram and signal are also free...

https://telegram.org/faq#q-how-are-you-going-to-make-money-out-of-this

Q: How are you going to make money out of this?
We believe in fast and secure messaging that is also 100% free.

Our founder and CEO Pavel Durov, who financed Telegram throughout most of its history, has outlined a strategy to make Telegram sustainable in this post.

While Telegram will introduce monetization in 2021 to pay for the infrastructure and developer salaries, making profits will never be an end-goal for us.

astrofool

biko wrote: »

https://telegram.org/faq#q-how-are-you-going-to-make-money-out-of-this

So, if it's free, you're the product, isn't true then?