WhatsApp messaging service on Thursday announced to its nearly two million users its updated terms, which would allow the app to share data from other users with its parent company Facebook.
The terms include facilitating e-commerce via WhatsApp as Facebook tries to earn revenue with the messaging service.
The new terms would allow WhatsApp Business users to use the updated features in the EU and the UK, a company spokesman told AFP news agency.
WhatsApp asked its users to accept the new terms and conditions or to no longer have access to the app.
Users angry about new terms
Privacy advocates harshly criticized the update, warning that the new terms were not legal.
Arthur Messaud, a lawyer for La Quadrature du net, an association that defends Internet users, told the AFP news agency that the update illegally forced users to accept the breach of their data if they wanted continue to use the messaging service.
“If the only way to refuse (modification) is to stop using WhatsApp, consent is forced as the use of personal data is illegal,” he said.
The update has sparked anger among some WhatsApp users, who are considering switching to other instant messaging services. Tesla boss and billionaire Elon Musk took to Twitter to ask people to switch to apps like Signal.
Within hours of WhatsApp’s announcement, the Signal messaging app said it was overloading new users.
The signal was developed by data privacy activists to implement a sealed sender policy, which hid message metadata, which could normally reveal the sender, receiver, and timing of messages.
Pressure from regulators
WhatsApp was once considered a secure instant messaging software, thanks to its end-to-end encryption.
European Union politicians used the app during the Brexit negotiations, giving rise to the term “WhatsApp diplomacy”. Subsequently, the European Commission changed course and urged its employees to switch to Signal, alleging privacy issues.
In May 2020, German data privacy commissioner Ulrich Kelber discouraged the use of WhatsApp in federal ministries and institutions, and urged government bodies to respect data protection.
Facebook, the parent company of WhatsApp, has been colliding with regulators in the United States and the EU for years, and the situation will reach an end by the end of 2020.
In December, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission and 48 states filed a lawsuit in December against Facebook for violating competition laws, accusing social media of monopolizing the market.
The EU also fined Facebook 110 million euros (then 120 million dollars) for misleading its users about the company’s power to link accounts between its other services following the controversial takeover of WhatsApp.
Facebook took over WhatsApp in 2014, two years after buying the Instagram photo service.