WhatsApp Ordered To Stop Sharing User Data With Facebook (theverge.com) 119
France's privacy watchdog CNIL has ordered WhatsApp to stop sharing user data with its parent company Facebook. According to a public notice posted on the French website, WhatsApp has a month to comply with the order. The Verge reports: The query began after WhatsApp added to its terms of service last year that it shares data with Facebook to develop targeted advertising, security measures, and to gather business intelligence. Upon investigating these claims, the CNIL ruled that while WhatsApp's intention of improving security measures was valid, the app's business intelligence reason wasn't as acceptable. After all, WhatsApp never told its users it was collecting data for business intelligence and there's no way to opt out without uninstalling the app. That violates "the fundamental freedoms of users," said the CNIL.
What is a WhatsApp? (Score:1)
What is a WhatsApp? (No, I won't google it. The summary ought to tell me what a WhatsApp is.)
Re: (Score:3)
Since it also says "Facebook", this isn't the "most used messenger". The most used one is something Chinese, WeeChat or something similar.
WhatsApp daily users: ~ 1 Billion.
WeChat daily users: ~ 700 Million
But they aren't really comparable. WhatsApp is a messenger app. WeChat is that, plus much more.
In China, if you see a beggar on the street and you don't have any spare change, you can do a WeChat transfer from your phone directly to the bum's phone. You can't do that with WhatsApp.
Re: What is a WhatsApp? (Score:1)
WhatsApp is so yesterday!
If you care about your privacy use Signal.
Re: What is a WhatsApp? (Score:1)
The parent comment should be upmodded. It's a valid and relevant question. The shitty articles linked to from the summary don't say what it is, either.
Re: What is a WhatsApp? (Score:5, Insightful)
if you are so tech illiterate to not know what facebook or WhatsApp are then don't read the story, tech is not for you.
Not so fast there. 30 years in the tech industry. Designing leading edge silicon products. There is no future in light entertainment for me. WhatsApp is just another program that runs on a phone. It's entirely reasonable to not know what it is, while knowing you could find out if you needed too.
Us old techies use signal anyway.
Re: What is a WhatsApp? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope. Not at all. Technology is a big subject. Contrary to what seems to pass for tech knowledge these days, phone apps do not comprise the entirety of technology. The size of a user base doesn't really count as a technical matter. Here's a contrary example: The key agreement protocol used in a messaging apps are gloriously technical. I can prattle on about the authentication and key agreement protocols in messaging apps all day.
Accusing people of ignorance based on transient criteria, now that's a character flaw.
Re: (Score:2)
>but saying you don't know what facebook, WhatsApp, office, Linux etc is completely contradicts that.
At no point did I claim not to know what Office, Facebook or Linux is. I use all three every day.
Inventing things other people didn't say and criticizing them for saying it is an even bigger character flaw.
Re: (Score:2)
At no point did I claim not to know what Office, Facebook or Linux is.
WhatsApp is used by more people than Facebook, and has WAY more users than Office or non-Android Linux.
If you don't know what WhatsApp is, you are seriously out of touch, and you shouldn't expect Slashdot articles to be dumbed down to accommodate you.
Disclaimer: I think WhatsApp is stupid. I don't use it. But I certainly know what it is.
Re: (Score:1)
To be fair, I work in tech and am barely aware of its existence. If I quizzed a random selection of friends I doubt I'd get a single person who uses it.
It might be a regional thing. It seems pretty big in Europe, but WhatsApp appears to have about 1/6th the market share of Facebook Messenger here in AU, which itself seems to have been installed by default and ignored (low active user share for both). I honestly have never had anyone ask about it or want to "WhatApp" me. FB chat for personal or SfB/Teams for
Re: (Score:2)
You can write THE best software in the world but it will Still be useless and worth next to nothing IF No one uses it.
Yes userbase matter, what made WhatsApp popoular is that it is using your phonenumber as screen name so it Will automaticly add everyone in your phonebook
So you think technological literacy is a popularity contest?
Re: (Score:2)
WhatsApp has a userbase of 1.3 billion users now, no it is not reasonable to say you are tech literate and don't know what it is
Is it reasonable for you to not realize that nobody in the US uses whatsapp?
Should I call you an insensitive clod?
Re: (Score:2)
Did you know the majority of WhatsApp users use WhatsApp?
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
Re: (Score:2)
Translation : "Old Techie here. I used to be with IT, but then they changed what IT was. Now what I'm with isn't IT anymore and what's IT seems weird and scary. It'll happen to you!"
While I sympathize with the IT professionals who usually get a raw deal from management, I'm not one of them. Pay attention. The information is there.
Re: (Score:2)
Us old techies use signal anyway.
Speak for yourself, youngster. "write" is my preferred way of sending messages, and "talk" if more than one line is needed. oo
Re: (Score:2)
Us old techies use signal anyway.
Speak for yourself, youngster. "write" is my preferred way of sending messages, and "talk" if more than one line is needed. oo
When I was actually younger, I had dial up BBSs and a little later, KA9Q.
Re: (Score:2)
Smells like shill in this thread, jesus christ. It's a messaging app, not the second coming.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: What is a WhatsApp? (Score:1)
What is this, a day of butthurt dumbshit millennials?
Kill yourself, whatsup your stupid n1gger cocksucking dumbass bitch.
Re: (Score:3)
Totally meaningless (Score:1)
If you believe a single word that Facebook or their vassal companies says about privacy or data sharing, then you deserve to be tracked by them. They're not stopping shit: they're going to store and exploit everything they possibly can. The regulators won't be able to tell what's going on anyway, and as a final option there's always paying lobbyists or using blackmail (government employees give plenty of information to FB too).
Re: (Score:3)
Well, they can obey or be banned from doing business is France I suppose?
No ban: CNIL will issue a fine, with daily penalties until Whatsapps comply or cease business.
Re: (Score:3)
and EU, which is arguably least corrupt organization in the world with any power at all to help privacy,
LOL. In the EU legislation is initiated by the European Commission [wikipedia.org], not the Parliament. European Commissioners are not elected and cannot be removed by a direct election [wikipedia.org]. Now if you're a corrupt corporation that makes them absolutely ideal people to lobby - they can initiate legislation but don't need to worry about getting re-elected.
And once legislation goes through the European Parliament EU member states are legally required to transpose them into EU law, regardless of whether the politicians in the na
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Wow. Calling europe corrupt while discussing law that has been passed down that actually benefits citizens and means huge investments and work for all businesses in and acting in europe.
You seem to gloss over the fact that proposals are still requested, debated and ultimately accepted or declined by the european parliament, which is democratically chosen.
European commisionars can actually be removed by the european parliament.
If you're so afraid of lobbying power, why single out the european commission? Loo
Re: (Score:2)
Calling europe corrupt while discussing law that has been passed down that actually benefits citizens and means huge investments and work for all businesses in and acting in europe.
Well I don't think this law does benefit citizens. It certainly doesn't mean 'huge investments' - in fact the most it could do is to convince Facebook and WhatsApp to close their EU offices. And even if a particular law did benefit citizens, that wouldn't change the fact that EU institutions are less accountable than the national institutions in EU countries.
You seem to gloss over the fact that proposals are still requested, debated and ultimately accepted or declined by the european parliament, which is democratically chosen.
Where, on multiple occasions your country is outvoted. And the UK is most often in the minority.
https://www.theguardian.com/wo... [theguardian.com]
However the problem is
Re: (Score:2)
All they'll achieve is that Facebook/WhatsApp shut down their physical office in France and operate from somewhere else instead, probably somewhere outside the EU.
Then they just have to play it the US way: seize assets, get executives arrested when they travel outside of US, extradite and prosecute them.
Re:Totally meaningless (Score:5, Informative)
Still makes no sense since the whole point of companies merging is to combine assets, of which customer data is an asset to both the separate facebook and whatsapp companies, and the new combined company under facebook control.
You don't seem to be familiar with European data protection laws. It's your data, not theirs.
Re:Totally meaningless (Score:5, Informative)
Some countries believe customer data is actually owned by the customer. If you want to do something with it, the customer needs to agree.
They frown upon companies who buy other companies for their data and use it for other purposes without consent.
America doesn't care though, they believe companies have more rights than individuals.
Re: (Score:1)
In the EU this permission needs to be specific and explicit. WhatsApp needs to get people to mark a checkbox for sharing their data with Facebook, having them agree to a general terms and conditions document is not specific enough.
Re: (Score:2)
I think this day in age that saying has another, more sinister meaning... in light of constant data breaches, wikileaks and similar, or really - the distributed nature of the internet in general, information wants to be free, and will always find a way to go public.
Re:Totally meaningless (Score:5, Informative)
The first is that, when WhatsApp launched, it made a big deal about privacy. It was founded by someone who grew up in the USSR and knew precisely how important it was to have a secure way of communicating that wasn't subject to interception. They provided end-to-end encryption and a privacy policy that explicitly prohibited sharing data with other companies or using it for advertising. They had a pretty reasonable business model: the service was free for the first year and then $1/year after that (the hosting costs were nowhere near that - they were using Erlang on FreeBSD on the server side and last I heard [a couple of years before Facebook bought them] could handle around a hundred thousand users per machine). At the very least, this should prevent them from sharing any data from users that signed up on the old T&Cs with Facebook and should require that Facebook provide them with a grace period to migrate to another service before changing the T&Cs.
That might be shaky, but the second point is a lot stronger: the EU antitrust regulator made not sharing data with Facebook an explicit requirement when allowing the purchase to go ahead. Facebook agreed to this before they bought WhatsApp and are now saying 'oh, actually, that's really hard so we don't want to do it'.
Re: (Score:2)
and a big fuck you to everyone who used WhatsApp before Facebook bought it because they didn't want to use Facebook Messenger.
Re: (Score:2)
The WhatsApp app (somewhat off-topic) (Score:2)
The WhatsApp app is terrible -- it demands that you give it access to all of your phone contacts before you're allowed to start sending messages with it. You can't block contact access and just tell it to message a specific number.
Bad design, but fits right in with FB's data mining plans.
Re: (Score:2)
Another terrible thing is that when you change phones you lose your chat history. Technically there's a backup option to Google drive and SD card but when both fails you search and find it fails for loads of people and no one knows why or how to fix it.
https://forums.oneplus.net/thr... [oneplus.net]
So Facebook have my chat history but WhatsApp won't let me see it on a new phone. Gee thanks, you utter fuckknuckles.
Back before Facebook owned the company of course it was actually a pretty decent application that effectively
Re: The WhatsApp app (somewhat off-topic) (Score:2)
So Facebook have my chat history but WhatsApp won't let me see it on a new phone. Gee thanks, you utter fuckknuckles.
That's not a bug, it's a feature.
No, I'm actually serious. You utter fucknuckle. The reason they can't show you your chat history is because they don't have it. When you use WhatsApp, unlike some other chat apps, your messages are generally either sent fully encrypted straight to the recipient, or, if the recipient cannot be reached directly, are sent via a WhatsApp server acting as an intermediary. If the latter, the server only stores the message long enough to confirm that your intended recipient had
Re: (Score:2)
The reason they can't show you your chat history is because they don't have it.
It's on the phone. There's a backup feature to Google drive or SD card, the problem is that sometimes (always?) a new phone will fail to restore the backups
https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/an... [whatsapp.com]
Re: The WhatsApp app (somewhat off-topic) (Score:2)
It's on the phone. There's a backup feature to Google drive or SD card, the problem is that sometimes (always?) a new phone will fail to restore the backups
Well, that's a different thing entirely. You said "Facebook have my chat history" and I was pointing out that they do not.
I was not aware of the backup problems with the app, but that's because I never use it; my devices are all rooted and I just do nightly backups of all my app data with TitaniumBackup. If the backup feature in the app is that unreliable I can certainly understand your frustration.
Re: (Score:2)
I haven't got Titanium Backup because I haven't rooted either device. Tried both Google Drive and copying the Whatsapp Folder and neither worked.
Chat history (Score:1)
Another terrible thing is that when you change phones you lose your chat history.
I'd call that a feature!
What's so important about past chats anyway? Chat away about whatever, move on. Another day, another round. Photos etc can be saved as desired.
Re: (Score:2)
> I'd quite like to keep that for sentimental reasons.
I'm so sorry for your loss.
Some family members have set up a WhatsApp group for sharing pictures and stories about a toddler in our family. I've been wanting to capture all of this to share with her when she's older - especially things from her grandmother who's in ill health.
I'm on Android, using Linux on my home computers. One thing you can do from the WhatsApp app is "Email Chat". If you don't attach media, you can send at least up to 9 months o
Re: (Score:2)
If you moved to a new computer and lost all your old emails/files would you consider that a feature?
Maybe *you* would, but some of us actually like having the option of keeping our data until we decide to delete it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You should get an iPhone: the iOS version backs up to iCloud. Like they say: it just works :)
My biggest problem with it is that it 1) strips all exif info from photos, and 2) over compresses/down-rezes everything. #1 is inline with it's privacy ethos, but both are annoying when you have friends who use it as the only way to share photos.
Bullshit (Score:2, Insightful)
"After all, WhatsApp never told its users it was collecting data for business intelligence and there's no way to opt out without uninstalling the app. That violates "the fundamental freedoms of users," said the CNIL."
No, that's the "trying to have your cake and it it, too" freedom. If it's free, you're the product. No way around that, short of opting out. If enough people do it, well, then the business model might change.
Re:Bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
Businesses operate within the rules of society, their society has different rules than yours.
Just because you don't approve doesn't mean they can't do it.
Re: (Score:3)
If it's free, you're the product
WhatsApp was free for the first year to build network effects and then $1/year (which was more than enough for cover operating costs). Users signed up to this and moved a lot of their communication to the platform. Facebook then moved to make it 'free' on the assumption that they could violate the terms that they agreed to with the EU antitrust regulator which prohibited using it for data mining. As I understand it, users are no longer offered the option of paying for the service.
FB stalking (Score:2)
I installed Whatsapp because it is very popular in Europe. For those who do not know, it is telephone number based chatting with ability to attach photos and voice memos to a chat, and now you can call for free through Whatsapp. It is useful for meeting up with a team at the hotel for example when you are all arriving at different times. I found groups stay active even long after a project ends though. I did not realize this info is going to Facebook though and I really don't like the idea that what is a cr
Re: FB stalking (Score:2)
The only data they have is which numbers you are interacting with and when.
Re: (Score:2)
The only data they have is which numbers you are interacting with and when.
Not sure this is correct. End to end encryption is for individual chat windows. Group chatting can be read by the mothership.
Re: FB stalking (Score:2)
Not sure this is correct. End to end encryption is for individual chat windows. Group chatting can be read by the mothership.
As explained in their white paper [whatsapp.com] (warning, PDF), group chats support full end-to-end encryption. Your client encrypts multiple copies of the message using the keys of each person in the conversation, and then sends them out as individual messages.
Re: (Score:2)
As you note, it essentially provides the features your phone should provide by default, but the operators are too slow to adapt, and so haven't got around to it yet.
However, to use Whatsapp, you have to let it have access to all your contacts. Therefore, Whatsapp (and Facebook) know the phone numbers of all the people you have in your phone. Since Facebook also asks for your phone number, they can tie your contacts to real humans pretty easily. Even without that, they can still infer much the same informati
Re: (Score:2)