The Facebook-owned messenger said that it wanted to 'address rumours' regarding the recent privacy policy update.
Amid a debate on the recent changes to the privacy policy of world's most popular messenger Whatsapp, the Facebook-owned company clarified that the changes do not affect the privacy of the messages that are sent using the app in any manner. Taking to Twitter, the platform said that it wanted to 'address rumours' regarding the recent update and stressed that it will continue to protect the private messages with end-to-end encryption.
Whatsapp added that neither it nor its parent company Facebook can read users' messages or hear their calls. It added that it does not keep a log of who a user is messaging or calling and cannot see the location shared by a user in a personal message.
“Neither WhatsApp nor Facebook can read your messages or hear your calls with your friends, family, and co-workers on WhatsApp. Whatever you share, it stays between you,” the platform said. "Our privacy policy update does not affect the privacy of your messages with friends or family," it added.
The clarification comes amid criticism against the messenger over its privacy policy update that took place last week. Notably, the updated privacy policy is mandatory for users to accept by February 8 or else they will lose access to their account.
WhatsApp has also released a new FAQ page on its website that highlights private communication on the app.
“While traditionally mobile carriers and operators store this information, we believe that keeping these records for two billion users would be both a privacy and security risk and we don't do it,” the company said.
On sharing contacts, WhatsApp said that it used only the phone numbers from the address book to make messaging fast and reliable, and does not share the contacts lists with the other apps Facebook offers.
Similar to chats, the groups also remain private, WhatsApp said. "We use group membership to deliver messages and to protect our service from spam and abuse. We don’t share this data with Facebook for ads purposes. Again, these private chats are end-to-end encrypted so we can’t see their content," the company.
Users can also download their data from within the app to see what information is present in the app, the company said.
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