WhatsApp launched a couple of days ago usernamesone of the most important innovations when it comes to contacting people. Until now, talking to someone on WhatsApp was synonymous with having their phone number, but not now. Now just know (or guess, we’ll come back to this later) your username.
To pave the way, WhatsApp now allows reserve your usernamethat @ that you have been using for so long on other social networks. And what can happen? That it is not available because someone has claimed it (shout out to the beast that @josedextro has reserved). That’s when WhatsApp puts a solution on the table: if you already use that user on Instagram, You can link your WhatsApp account with said social network and try to claim it.
Basically, reading is different. Because, in essence, this is still a mechanism to promote the unification of accounts and have more data to show targeted advertising in an app that, by design, does not allow that option.
Your @ is more than a name
Last year, precisely around this time, WhatsApp announced the arrival of advertising to the application. The proposal had three branches:
- Promoted channels.
- Paid subscriptions for channels.
- Advertising in the States.
WhatsApp confirmed that it was not going to touch the chats screen or the chats themselves, but that the ads would be limited to the “News” tab. According to the platform, 1.5 billion people access the content of that section every day. The question, however, is obvious: how can Meta, the world’s largest targeted advertising platform along with Google, show personalized ads in an app whose content is encrypted?
If our user is not available, but we use it on Instagram, WhatsApp allows us to unify accounts to be able to claim it | Image: Xataka
Last year, Nikila Srinivasan, VP of Business Messaging at Meta, explained that would use data that they do have access to, such as the country, city, device language, channels we follow and interactions with ads in the “News” tab. But he also explained something else, and that is that if a person decides, voluntarily, link your WhatsApp account with the Meta account center (Instagram, Facebook and Threads), information could be cross-referenced to target ads.
Coincidentally, now, practically a year after this announcement, WhatsApp launches the ability to have a username and be able to claim it if you already use it on Instagram. Platform that, by the way, disabled end-to-end encryption in private messages just a few weeks ago.
By linking the accounts through the Meta account center, and always on paper, Zuckerberg’s firm would have the ability to link your activity on Instagram, Threads and Facebook with WhatsApp. That would allow, in theory, Advertising could be directed to the user while maintaining end-to-end encryption how popular it made the app in its day.
Based on creating a system that allows us to talk to other people without sharing the phone number, WhatsApp has devised a mechanism to unify accounts and expand the reach of advertisements. It is not mandatory, far from it, but the temptation to have the same @ in all apps is strong. And dangerous, because anyone could try to guess your username to contact you.
What’s more, when you reserve your username, it is activated by default so that anyone who knows it can write to you. This must be changed manually, although privacy concerns maybe you would like to know that you can set a key so that, if someone wants to write to us, they not only need the @, but also a four-digit password that you must give to the contact at the time.
By activating the password, we will prevent anyone from writing to us if they guess our username
WhatsApp, for its part, fences which has “multiple layers of defense: username keys limit who can contact you, we restrict how many new people any account can contact, and our systems detect and block patterns of abuse.”
If you wish, you can access the Meta account center from here and unlink your accounts. Another option is to opt for an app without ads, as encrypted as WhatsApp and less popular like Signal. Curiously, WhatsApp Plus subscription does not include the ability to remove ads.
breaking a spear
The reservation system has a positive point, and that is to guarantee that public figures or well-known users can have the same @ on WhatsApp. Best of luck to ElRubius trying to book @elrubiusWTF, or to Ibai Llanos trying to get @ibaillanos. There are personalities who may have a genuine interest in making their symbol recognizable and the same as on other social networks. This system allows it.
Image | Xataka
In Xataka | We have turned WhatsApp into an “emotional pacifier”. And science warns that it is making us more fragile
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings