Both Telegram and Signal in particular were reported to get registration spikes during WhatsApp outages and controversies. Since the complete roll out of this feature, users cannot check old messages before this period on the Web version anymore. Lucky Friends casino In January 2021, WhatsApp announced a controversial new privacy policy allowing WhatsApp to share data with its parent company, Facebook.
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  • Since the complete roll out of this feature, users cannot check old messages before this period on the Web version anymore.

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  • In October 2023 they also introduced passkey support, where a user can verify their login with on-device biometrics, rather than SMS.

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  • A message that promises to allow access to their WhatsApp friends’ conversations, or their contact lists, has become the most popular hit against anyone who uses the application in Brazil.
  • There were a series of incidents between 2017 and 2020, after which WhatsApp announced changes for Indian users of the platform that labels forwarded messages as such.
  • Days after the announcement, WhatsApp users experienced a loss of service, leading to anger across social media.

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  • Higher usage was reported by frontline clinical staff to keep up with care needs, even though NHS trust policies do not permit their use.

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App support

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  • In November 2020, UPI payments via WhatsApp were initially restricted to 20 million users, and to 100 million users in April 2022, and became generally available to everyone in August 2022.

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  • The new privacy policy would not apply within the EU, as it is illegal under the GDPR.

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  • Linked devices automatically log out after 14 days of inactivity on the primary phone.

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  • In January 2021, WhatsApp announced an updated privacy policy which stated that WhatsApp would share user data with Facebook and its “family of companies” beginning February 2021.

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  • It became the world’s most popular messaging application in 2015, with 900 million users, and had more than 2 billion active users worldwide in February 2020.

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  • In 2016, WhatsApp was accused of copying features from a then-unreleased version of iMessage.

Koum then hired a friend in Los Angeles, Chris Peiffer, to develop a BlackBerry version, which arrived two months later. However, when early versions of WhatsApp kept crashing, Koum considered giving up and looking for a new job. A month earlier, after Koum purchased an iPhone, he and Acton decided to create an app for the App Store. The idea started off as an app that would display statuses in a phone’s Contacts menu, showing if a person was at work or on a call.

Messenger Plus for WhatsApp

According to a white paper that was released along with the announcement, WhatsApp messages are encrypted with the Signal Protocol. The company also announced plans to implement reactions, the ability for administrators to delete messages in groups and voice calls up to 32 participants. In April 2023, the app rolled out a feature that would allow account access across multiple phones, in a shift that would make it more like competitors. Now, the feature is also made available to iOS users, allowing them to link up to four iPhones. The web client was not standalone, and required the user’s phone to stay on and connected to the internet. Since then, linked devices support has expanded and more information is written in the Platform Support part of this article.

Third-party clients

In October 2020, WhatsApp rolled out a feature allowing users to mute both individuals and group chats forever. According to the company, messages could be edited within a 15-minute window after being sent. Edited messages were tagged as “edited” to inform recipients that the content had been modified. On February 24, 2017, WhatsApp launched a new Status feature similar to Snapchat and Facebook stories. The Cloud API enables businesses to integrate WhatsApp with other software, have a central WhatsApp account for multiple users and implement advanced automation. He also said that the app would not display any third-party ads, and that it would have new features such as the ability to communicate with businesses.

Data Not Linked to You

At that point WhatsApp was adding about 25 million new users every month, or 833,000 active users per day. The organization reported a massive drop-off in traffic for the blocked services, though the country’s government made no official statements about the block. In May 2019, WhatsApp was attacked by hackers who installed spyware on a number of victims’ smartphones. A Wired report noted the attack was able to inject malware via calls to the targeted phone, even if the user did not answer the call. In January 2022, an unsealed surveillance application revealed that WhatsApp started tracking seven users from China and Macau in November 2021, based on a request from US DEA investigators.

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  • In December 2023, WhatsApp’s “View Once” feature expanded to include voice messages.

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  • WhatsApp has been officially supported for iPads and its iPadOS since May 27, 2025.

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  • The Cloud API enables businesses to integrate WhatsApp with other software, have a central WhatsApp account for multiple users and implement advanced automation.
  • On May 18, 2017, the European Commission announced that it was fining Facebook €110 million for “providing misleading information about WhatsApp takeover” in 2014.
  • In January 2018, WhatsApp released a standalone business app called WhatsApp Business which can communicate with the standard WhatsApp client.

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  • The idea started off as an app that would display statuses in a phone’s Contacts menu, showing if a person was at work or on a call.

    • |}

Older versions

On May 18, 2017, the European Commission announced that it was fining Facebook €110 million for “providing misleading information about WhatsApp takeover” in 2014. The idea, he said, is to develop a group of basic internet services that would be free of charge to use – “a 911 for the internet”. This would give them some context for why they are important, and that will lead them to pay for more services like this – or so the hope goes. By February 2013, WhatsApp had about 200 million active users and 50 staff members. The service was created by WhatsApp Inc. of Mountain View, California, which was acquired by Facebook in February 2014 for approximately US$19.3 billion. It became the world’s most popular messaging application in 2015, with 900 million users, and had more than 2 billion active users worldwide in February 2020.