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| Edited By: |Source: DNA |Updated: Aug 31, 2016, 08:10 AM IST
The updated terms of use and privacy policy rolled out by the world’s most popular messaging application, WhatsApp, has created concern and confusion among its users. At the application level, it reflects the inevitable integration of WhatsApp with Facebook. There is no doubt that wedding of its social media and messaging apps will be a money-spinner for the company. Though Facebook has unequivocally stated that it would not mine user messages or photos sent through WhatsApp to sell advertisements or consumer information to third-party companies, the deviation from the original terms of use has caused much heartburn. WhatsApp already claims to offer end-to-encryption; so the fears that Facebook would mine message data may be unfounded. It was two years ago that WhatsApp was purchased by Facebook for a whopping US$19 billion, and those who were naive enough to believe that Facebook would not demand its pound of flesh have only themselves to blame. Of course, millions of users had hitched themselves to WhatsApp on co-founder Jan Koum’s promise that the app would not violate user privacy or gather user data.
Koum’s original plan to monetise WhatsApp was a $1 per year charge per user to spare them of annoying advertisements but Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg clearly does not want to take that route. The new privacy policy warns WhatsApp users that they have 30 days time before WhatsApp begins sharing phone numbers and other metadata with Facebook. Users have the choice of opting out of this integration plan, but Facebook will still collect some information from WhatsApp, though it is not clear what data would still be shared. With phone numbers and metadata like call list, chat list and contact list, Facebook can gather better friend suggestions and offer more relevant advertisements by mapping geographical locations. Facebook is also positioning WhatsApp as a cheaper delivery platform to send messages and receipts pertaining to e-commerce purchases, banking transactions, and online marketing rather than the costly SMS services offered by telecom companies. In short, after taking its own sweet time to integrate WhatsApp into the group’s mother app, Facebook has now revealed its hand on the company’s big plans for monetising WhatsApp.
In the great game now being played by companies to corner a larger share of the online advertising pie, users rue that their personal computers, smart-phones, phone numbers, email addresses, contact lists, web searches, online posts, e-mails and messages are being stored, parsed, processed and shared or sold to third parties. However, users also demand a seamless experience in searching the web, sharing on social media, and sending personal messages, and they tend to find these attributes in the products offered by big companies like Google, Facebook and Microsoft thanks to their wide user base despite the privacy risks. Google generates nearly four times more advertising revenue compared to Facebook, primarily through the success of Adwords and Youtube. But its products like Google Plus and Hangouts have failed to break Facebook’s domination of social media and messaging.
The plan to monetise WhatsApp by Facebook has been excellently calibrated. By not displaying ads on WhatsApp, the gathering of user data from the app will not appear too intrusive. But by opening up WhatsApp for businesses to send messages and alerts, Facebook will make the app more indispensable than it already is. With facilities like video calling on the way, Facebook is upping its game and the $19 billion it spent two years ago to buy WhatsApp is turning out to be a smart buy and a lost opportunity for Google.
