WhatsApp users flock to Telegram, Signal following privacy policy debacle

11 Jan 2021

NEWSWATCH: According to a news report by TimesLive, more and more WhatsApp users are downloading Telegram and Signal due to WhatsApp's recent privacy policy update. The new policy asks users to agree to share their information with parent company Facebook.

Photo by Robin Worrall on Unsplash

WhatsApp assured users in its update that messages shared between contacts are protected and are not accessible to third parties. It said messages are immediately deleted from its servers as soon as they have been delivered to the intended recipient. Therefore, messages are rather stored on users' phones.

The report further mentions that Facebook explained the policy by saying that they collect information about activity on its services, like service-related, diagnostic and performance information. This includes information about activity - including how its services are used, services settings, how users interact with others using its services, and the time, frequency and duration of activities and interactions, log files, and diagnostic, crash, website and performance logs and reports.

Use Signal
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 7, 2021

A different report by Moneyweb mentions that Signal and Telegram messaging apps are seeing a sudden increase in demand after the policy update and that Signal’s popularity shot up further on after it was endorsed by Elon Musk, who has one of the most-followed accounts on Twitter and by the micro-blogging site’s top boss Jack Dorsey.