WhatsApp is showing a warning to all users according must accept the new privacy conditions. These conditions are related to a change in the number of data that WhatsApp shares with Facebook. And they affect non-European app users.
As always, what happens with the changes in WhatsApp that concern privacy, the new notice that is appearing in the mobile application of all users is raising both expectation and controversy. Surely if you opened WhatsApp today you also missed that notice, a change in the privacy conditions that you must accept to continue using the application. This change concerns the way WhatsApp and Facebook share data outside of Europe.
‘WhatsApp will update its conditions and privacy policy’
The notice of the new privacy conditions is appearing around the world As we said, most WhatsApp users are encountering an alert as soon as the application starts. As has happened on previous occasions, this alert reports changes in the conditions of use, some changes that force the company to request authorization from users. In principle the alert should not appear to European users since the alteration in the privacy conditions it does not affect them, but the fact is that it is appearing on all phones.
WhatsApp updated its privacy terms for users outside the European Union (for those of us who live in that territory there has also been an update, but the relationship with Facebook remains the same). These terms clarify a greater collaboration with the companies of the Facebook group: WhatsApp will share much more user data with these companies. Given the importance of said data, all those who use the application have received a notice that they must expressly accept the new conditions. They can refuse, but must accept it before the privacy terms come into effect on February 8, 2021.
Although European citizens are also receiving notice of changes to the privacy terms, that does not mean that we will share more data with Facebook since we are covered by the GDPR data protection regulations. European WhatsApp users do not share the application data with Facebook or any of its companies to improve the platform, neither currently nor in the future. At least that’s what the GDPR guarantees.
The notice that is currently jumping on WhatsApp can be rejected, but said rejection will only be temporary. In any case, that a European citizen accepts it does not imply that he gives the express authorization to WhatsApp to share the data since is strictly prohibited by the GDPR. In this sense, the same does not matter if it is accepted now as if permission is given later. Of course, surely you have to accept it sooner or later because WhatsApp will continue to show it until it is approved. And as of February 8, 2021 could block the accounts of those who do not accept the notice.
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The news
What is the WhatsApp privacy notice and what happens if you don’t accept it
was originally published in
Xataka Android
by
Ivan Linares
.
