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Privacy comparison: Signal, Telegram, Whatsapp and Facebook

WhatsApp is the messaging application most used in Spain, although last week was complicated for the Facebook app. After the announcement of its change in the privacy conditions, which affects those who are outside the EU, millions of users abandoned the application, moving to others such as Telegram or Signal, which offer a better treatment of privacy.

The exodus of WhatsApp users has been so massive that the application has had to backtrack in changing these privacy conditions. Despite this, many criticize the large amount of data that the Facebook app obtains of the users. Is it true that they collect more data than Signal or Telegram?

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Data collection on Signal, Telegram, WhatsApp and Facebook

The change in the privacy conditions of WhatsApp, which affected all those outside the European Union, meant that the messaging app was going to share a greater amount of data with other companies in the Facebook group. This would allow the social network to collect a greater amount of personal data from users, so that they can create more accurate profiles about each user.

How much personal data does WhatsApp, Facebook, Telegram or Signal collect? Now that many users are leaving the Facebook messaging app to switch to others such as Telegram or Signal, whose use has exploded, it is important to have clear differences in terms of privacy in all of them, such as the information they collect from each user.

There is a clear difference in terms of privacy between these four applications, which is something that has caused many users to decide to start using Telegram or Signal, the app recommended by the EU as it is the most private. At the functional level, all these apps provide us with the same functions: messages in individual and group chats, individual and group calls and video calls, also in groups.

What data do they collect

This image shows us the amount of data that each of these applications collects. We leave you with all of said data below:

Signal: The only data the app collects is your phone number, but it makes no attempt to collect your personal data. There are no attempts to link the phone number to your identity.
Telegram: Telegram collects little data about users, a series of essential data for the operation of the application, are these data:
- Contact information.
- Contacts.
- User ID (user identification number).
WhatsApp: The messaging application is known to collect a large amount of user data. These are all the data they store from those who use the app:
- Device ID.
- User ID.
- Ad data.
- Shopping history.
- Approximate location.
- Phone number.
- Email address.
- Contacts.
- Product information.
- Crash data (crash / problem information).
- Performance data.
- Other diagnostic data.
- Payment information.
- Customer Support.
- Product interaction.
- Other user content data.
Facebook: The one that collects the most data of all is the social network, which has an extensive list of data on users, which can be downloaded in its renewed interface.
- Shopping history.
- Other financial information.
- Exact location.
- Approximate location.
- Physical address.
- Email address.
- Name.
- Phone number.
- Other contact information.
- Contacts.
- Photos and / or videos.
- Game content.
- Other usage content.
- Search history.
- Browsing history.
- User ID.
- Device ID.
- Product interaction.
- Signal.
- Ad data.
- Other usage data.
- Information on accidents / problems (Crash data).
- Performance data.
- Other diagnostic data.
- Health data.
- Physical activity data.
- Payment history / Payment information.
- Audio data.
- Customer support.
- iMessage.