WhatsApp

One of the biggest reasons for migrating away from WhatsApp is privacy. It's been a problem ever since WhatsApp was launched. Indeed, I discussed it with the founders when it was new, ish, and they said that they had deliberately designed the system to create visibility between users. When I pointed out that a combination of various features compromised personal security, that was not something that concerned them... anyone can get your phone number, they said.

in Understanding Suspicion in Financial Crime Nigel Morris-Cotterill* says that only three facts are needed for the genesis of suspicion.

Now, with the acquisition of LinkedIn by Facebook, three US companies know far more than three facts, actually almost everything, about you, wherever you are in the world. Move over NSA: the Google-Microsoft-Facebook axis of evil is the real threat to personal privacy and security.

While the average article focusses on the announcement of WhatsApp's about-face regarding the implementation of advertising, its founders having repeatedly assured user that the messaging platform would never carry advertising, the bigger issue is this: Facebook, which bought WhatsApp and authorised those assurances, and guaranteed users privacy, is about to plunder WhatsApp user data and to make it available to third parties. USers have a stark choice: try to sort out a complex opt out (that depends on whether Facebook can be trusted and history repeatedly demonstrates otherwise), to accept the total loss of privacy in messaging or to leave WhatsApp entirely.

When WhatsApp was bought by Facebook, the immediate fear was not the NSA or other government snooping (most aware users took that for granted anyway) but the likelihood that FaceBook would link WhatsApp activity to FaceBook activity giving the company access to far more information about one's life than users might like. Yesterday, WhatsApp addressed that concern. But before it did so, it quietly provided a back door to all your WhatsApp data and sold it as a benefit.