Personal Data Privacy
 

In this day and age, and esp when I am still an active Facebook / WhatsApp / IG user, I really find it quite ironic that I am posting about personal data privacy concerns. But spurred by the upcoming user agreement changes from WhatsApp, I did a bit of homework and decided that I would at least remove the Facebook Messenger app from my phone, and follow Elon Musk's recommendation to use Signal over WhatsApp as much as possible.

https://specials-images.forbesimg.co...d670/960x0.jpg

Here is a quick comparative diagram of the persoal data that each messaging apps collect from you and your iOS device when you install / use the app. The number of data items each app collects from you is as follows:

Signal: 1 -- your phone number is collected, but it is not tied to your Signal account
Telegram: 4 items
iMessage: 4 items
WhatsApp: 32 items
Facebook Messenger: over 100 items

While the collection of private information here only applies to the iOS / Apple Store version of the app, I am willing to bet that a similar amount of data is collected on the Android version of the apps as well. The Google Play Store does not require this level of information to be declared, so it is difficult to tell how exactly the apps behave in an Android environment.

Getting back to the personal data collected on an iOS device, I have personally verified the truthfulness of this data privacy collection, and you can see for yourself the data items each app collect from your iOS device from the following links:

Signal:
https://apps.apple.com/.../signal-pr...../id874139669

Telegram:
https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/telegr...er/id686449807

iMessage:
https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT211975

WhatsApp:
https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/whatsa...er/id310633997

Facebook Messenger:
https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/messenger/id454638411


Finally, if you are interested in the subject, the following two articles might be of interest to you:

WhatsApp Beaten By Apple’s New iMessage Privacy Update

Do You Suddenly Need To Stop Using WhatsApp?

As a friend has pointed out, the Facebook app from the Apple App Store collects exactly the same personal data as the FB messenger app:

https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/facebook/id284882215

and that sort of makes just deleting FB messenger app a moot point if I don't also delete the Facebook app as well. FailFish

So perhaps it is time to cut the FB addiction altogether on my phone?

I don't know how it compares, but I switched to just accessing fb via the browser on my phone.

No Facebook, no twitter, no instagram etc. I don’t even allow smart home shit other than our phones.

I use whatsapp constantly as it’s great for group messaging. iMessage for my iPhone is garbage for that unless they also have an iphone

I think this really boils down to how much you (as an individual) value your privacy. To a lot of people, this is not a big deal as we are already enveloped into a data-driven ecosystem by ways of using Google etc. My personal assumption is most people don't really care because it doesn't impact them in any way, or any foreseeable future.

Over the years, I have been mindful of my privacy, and how much companies know about me, and what they do with my data as a customer. Any option there is to leverage an opt-out or what have you, I will take advantage of. I am not at liberty to give up my personal conversations I have with my friends and family. These conversations are private, and should remain private.

I'm particular about this as my personal data has been breached at companies I've done business with such as airlines, hotels, and car rental companies (I travel a lot for work) and it has personally affected me where it made my life extremely difficult to apply for financial services, and most recently in the past five years, apply for a mortgage. Since the data breach, I have seen a sharp increase in spam emails and robo calls/scams. We often take privacy for granted, until it impacts you directly.

Just remember Signal is free for now. when more people jump on it after leaving WA, expect the same things to happen to it that happened to WA.

At least for now, I think that would be a good thing to do.

I totally agree with your comment that to a lot of people, their data privacy is not that big of a deal. I would also say that in this case, given how FB Messenger essentially does the same function as many other messaging apps, there isn't really too much of a point to use it when its personal data privacy is vastly inferior to those of the many other alternatives.

The hard part is getting other people to switch over. Out of my friends, maybe 1 has any regard for things like this. The rest don't care at all, they just want convenience.

Absolutely. Changing platforms on stuff like this is totally a chicken-and-egg problem, and I'd say we really have to be practical about the approach as well.

For switching away from WhatsApp, for the time being, I don't really see a pressing need to quit WhatsApp since I am both a Facebook and a WhatsApp user, so the mother company already has access to my personal info one way or another. But hopefully, more people will move on to the Signal boat as time goes on -- or at least until Signal starts selling off our info for profit as SumAznGuy was saying lol~

Apparently Parler wasn’t very private with user data :lawl:

i'm not getting rid of gmail anytime soon so yeah, already compromised...

i'd use iMessage exclusive if only everyone close gets into iOS

if it wasn't for work i'd deleted Whatsapp ages ago, it comes in handy traveling in 3rd world countries as well

fb messenger was a heap of shit, havent installed that in ages