WhatsApp is full of nice (homemade) stickers. But don’t just forward stickers from WhatsApp to your friends, because you can get a fine.
Don’t just forward WhatsApp stickers: you risk a fine
According to lawyer Yaşar Bayram, you cannot simply forward every WhatsApp sticker you receive. In an interview with Radar it provides more clarity.
He says that portrait rights apply to a sticker on which someone is recognizable. This means that the person portrayed can rely on this if he has a reasonable interest in privacy. This interest must be weighed against the freedom of expression of the person who made the sticker.
WhatsApp stickers and the importance of privacy
But when can you rely on your privacy? With a normal, neutral photo, privacy interests will not weigh so heavily. As a result, the right to disclosure will take precedence more often. But according to the lawyer, privacy interests will outweigh if the sticker can damage your reputation.
That is not the only thing you have to take into account. For the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the context and privacy impact are also important. This does not apply when using a portrait for personal or domestic use. For example, think of a sticker that you share in your family group on WhatsApp.
Things will be different if the sticker ends up in more groups or even goes viral. Then there is no longer any domestic use and you must take the GDPR into account. A sticker with a portrait must then have a legitimate interest or have permission to use it.
Can you get fined for sharing WhatsApp stickers?
So in theory, you could get a fine for sharing a rather unflattering sticker of your best friend. But Bayram says that in practice the chance of a fine is very small. This must really be a major and serious violation of privacy.
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