After the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) issued a Penalty of a whopping 225 million euros Against WhatsApp, Messenger is now changing its privacy policy. The latter was also ordered by the DPC, as the previous guidelines and information on the use of user data were too opaque. Although the chat app is being reviewed against the fine, WhatsApp is enforcing the change in data protection regulations with immediate effect.

New data protection regulations for WhatsApp: what changes?

Meta Messenger emphasizes the Information page To the new guidelines that users do not have to take any action to accept the modified provisions. The chat app also writes that not much will change for users in Europe and Britain. So it says on the website:

[…] The way we operate our service, for example how we process, use or share your data with others, including our parent company Meta, has not changed as a result of this update.

Much more, the data protection regulations would now be better structured and clearer. For users, this means the following:

• WhatsApp now makes it possible for users to understand in more detail what data is stored and used for what purpose. Even when this information is deleted or passed on to third-party providers, users can now track it more accurately.
• The chat service explains why user data is transmitted globally and across borders and how this information is protected.
• The legal bases are now presented in a much more transparent way and can be understood more easily.

According to the messaging service, nothing changes in the encryption of messages from one end to the other. This continues to exist and makes future conversations only available to senders and recipients.

As before, we cannot read your private messages or listen to your calls as they are both end-to-end encrypted. Nothing will ever change about that.

New data protection regulations, old problems?

WhatsApp has seen a huge backlash in terms of changes to data protection regulations in recent months. Because the messaging service experienced huge user pushback after the guidelines were changed for users: within their data outside of Europe they also share their data with parent company Meta by default. Hence, many users switched to alternative apps like Signal. Since then, WhatsApp has tried to put privacy protection to the fore in numerous campaigns and keep users in the app or get them back.

You can read the new data protection regulations in detail here watch.