And if so, why exactly? It says it's end-to-end encrypted. The metadata isn't. But what is metadata and is it bad that it's not? Are there any other problematic things?
I think I have a few answers for these questions, but I was wondering if anyone else has good answers/explanations/links to share where I can inform myself more.
Is Facebook bad for privacy?
Whatsapp is Facebook. Literally. Whatsapp sold themselves to Facebook.
So yes: it's bad for privacy.
Your address book is uploaded to Facebook servers when you use Whatsapp. And each time you interact, they know with who and link this information with other profiles and users of the Meta products.
This image somehow is such low quality on my device that I can't read any of the text on it.
While the messages itself are encrypted, the WhatsApp App itself can still collect data from you from the Device your using it on:
- Phone number
- operating system
- associated contacts Etc.
And given this is a Meta owned company, we can probably assume they profile you from that.
If you're on Android, the E2E is meaningless as WhatsApp can read what you type, just as the Facebook app can, since they have keyboard access.
I don't know that they do this, just saying it's a leak point, and since it's Meta/Facebook/Zuckerberg, well, let's just say I'm a bit cynical.
WhatsApp Moderators Can Read Your Messages - https://gizmodo.com/whatsapp-moderators-can-read-your-messages-1847629241
That means if they want to see your messages they do it anytime, not only when someone report it.
If a government want access to the messages they can access.
