The minimal looks, super smooth functionality made WhatsApp the most popular messaging app on the planet Earth. However, it isn’t still perfect, so the parent company, Facebook frequently makes interesting tweaks to increase the functionality of WhatsApp and user experience.
An update in the WhatsApp is worth knowing for a normal user only if the update changes the looks, functionality or the user interaction with it. This update is one such thing and a must know for every user.
WhatsApp introduced a new feature to increase admin’s power
A new WhatsApp update has been released which is aimed at increasing admin powers. This feature is what we all needed for years. WhatsApp announced this update via their blog.
1. An administrator of a group can select the “Only Admins” option, which will only allow the admin to send, alter messages in a group. WhatsApp will hide the chat text input bar to all other users. The only way you can message in the group is by informing admins. This is a handy feature for organizations, school groups.
To enable this setting, open “Group Info”-> Group Settings > Send Messages -> “Only Admins.”
“Today, we’re launching a new group setting where only admins are able to send messages to a group. One way people use groups is to receive important announcements and information, including parents and teachers at schools, community centers, and non-profit organizations. We’ve introduced this new setting so admins can have better tools for these use cases.” mentioned in a blog post by WhatsApp.
WhatsApp now allows users recognize forwarded messages [13-June-2018]
WhatsApp has added a new tag “Forwarded” at the top of the messages that are sent via ‘Forward’ option. This tag appears to both sender and receiver. This feature is available for all beta users for a while and it is expected to release for all users very soon. read more about it.
ChatWatch: a creepy app that leaks your data[1-April-2018]
It’s not even been a month since the Cambridge Analytica scandal happened, and now the Facebook-owned company, WhatsApp is in the news for yet another data breach. It’s not that big still spoils your privacy.
A creepy app named “Chat Watch” is using loopholes in WhatsApp to tell users how often their friends visit WhatsApp, Whether they are online or not, and can even estimate their bedtime too. This app works even if the last seen feature is disabled. Sounds scary. Right?
Chat Watch uses WhatsApp’s online/offline status feature to leak data of WhatsApp friends. This works even if the victim disables the last seen feature.
Using the data, this app can estimate how often your friend uses WhatsApp. It can even predict the time they sleep, their sleeping time, and waking time. This was spotted by a tech website lifehacker.com. Now it’s definitely a good time to expose your friend’s privacy.
This app was first made available in AppStore. Later, it was removed by Apple which is very obvious. Now it is available in Android PlayStore which might get pulled from PlayStore too. In addition to this creepiness, developers are planning to develop a web version of this app.
QR codes scanning to pay others [26-Mar-2018]
WhatsApp recently entered payments game in India. However, it got slammed by the Paytm for its improper implementation of UPI payment system. Despite these issues, WhatsApp made a strong move countering them.
Previously, you can make a WhatsApp payment to an individual only if he is in your contact list which is super annoying and stopping WhatsApp from being a full potential Payments app.
But now, WhatsApp introduced a new option “QR scanning“. Basically what it means is, now you can just scan the unique QR code of any individual to make a transaction. Now you no longer need to add any numbers to your contact list to send money.
How to enable it
1. Open WhatsApp and navigate to ‘Settings & Payments’ and select the ‘New Payment’ option underneath your linked bank accounts.
2. At the top of the ‘New Payments’ screen, tap on the ‘Scan QR code’ option on the left and then scan the UPI code of the person you want to pay, on their device.
3. The final step is to enter the amount and UPI pin to make a successful transaction.
Currently, WhatsApp is testing this feature which means this feature is only available for beta testers. WhatsApp is frequently making improvements to make it better and a full potential payments app.
Intentions are very clear. WhatsApp isn’t stepping back in Payments game, in fact, it could even create new space in payments game and change the way the people interact with payments. This sounds very interesting for us and threatening for giants like Paytm and Google Tez. Let us see how this game ends.