The instant messaging app allows anyone with your mobile number to spy on you without your knowledge. Here’s how to fix it
Exchanging messages on WhatsApp with your friends or family may seem perfectly trivial: we discuss in groups, we exchange photos and videos, we keep in touch with the childhood friend who went to the other side of the world , we make a video call so that the grandparents can see the children, etc.
The instant messaging application, which belongs to Facebook, replaces the usual SMS application and the videoconferencing application at a moment’s notice by bringing everything together in a single entity, completely free, and devilishly easy to use.
But behind this idyllic appearance, the application presents a number of drawbacks for those who wish to pay even a little attention to their privacy. Although it works like an SMS app, WhatsApp, like most instant messaging apps, lets your contacts know the date and time of your last connection, know when you received a message, and more. worse, whether you’ve read it.
A message sent is almost inevitably received
It is therefore difficult to claim that you have not seen or received the message from one of your contacts. By simply checking the time of your last connection, a caller can instantly know that you saw that they had sent a message and that you don’t want to respond, at least, right away. Seen from your correspondent’s smartphone, his message is stamped “received”, before changing to “read” when you open the conversation.
To avoid this, you can change the privacy settings of the app. Open WhatsApp, go to Settings, then in Account, go to the Privacy options.
In the Seen at menu, change the setting to My contacts or Person. None of your contacts will be able to know the date and time of your last connection. By no longer sharing this information, you will not be able to know when your loved ones opened the application for the last time.
Anyone can find out who you are with your number
The worst is yet to come. By creating an account on WhatsApp, you have, without a doubt, added your name and your photo, convenient for your loved ones to identify you easily, and much more user-friendly in group conversations. Smile, you are “stalked”!
From now on, anybody in possession of your mobile number will be able to identify you, by putting a face on this number but also a name. As WhatsApp works like a simple texting app, it doesn’t require an invitation to start a conversation and doesn’t send any alerts to let you know your number is in the address book of a new, potentially unknown contact. A reverse image search later, and it’s possible to find you on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.
Do you have any doubts about a LeBonCoin seller? In a few seconds you will be able to put a face and a name on the number of the author of this somewhat suspicious advertisement. If the number is in the ad or if you retrieve it after initiating a conversation from the platform, create a new contact card for this stranger with said number in the native directory of your smartphone.
Next, open WhatsApp, then in Discussions, create a new conversation. Select the unknown contact. The conversation opens, but the unknown contact him, knows absolutely nothing. Tap their name to access detailed profile information. Well done ! you now know his name and can even identify him if you meet him on the street. With a little luck, he will even have added a status that will allow you to know a little more about his habits.
The interest of locking your profile data
But if you can do it and you have no bad intentions, tell yourself that any malicious individual in possession of your mobile number can do it too, with all the abuses that this can cause: identity, discrimination, etc.
To avoid reaching such extremes, lock your WhatsApp account, again, by customizing the Privacy settings. Open Settings, go to Account then Privacy and modify the Profile picture, News and Status settings so that they are visible only to you or your contacts.
By default, WhatsApp sets up your activity, profile picture and news so that they are visible to everyone.