After years of providing free services without any bells attached, WhatsApp is now going to start showing ads on the popular chat app. To be clear, users will only see ads on the Status screen — the app’s take on Instagram’s Stories.
So just like you see an ad after watching a few stories on Instagram, you will see ads on WhatsApp after you’ve scrolled through a few Status updates.
The company said that its ad mechanism uses signals like users’ country or city, language, and the channels they’re following, as well as data from ads that users interact with.
Meta said it is not using personally identifiable data, such as users’ phone numbers, messages, calls, and groups to serve targeted ads. If a user has added their WhatsApp account to Meta’s Account Center, the company will use their Account preferences to show ads.
My own approach is that there is no way to reach me via WhatsApp. Whenever I need to reach someone who “has WhatsApp”, I’ll just use their “WhatsApp number” anyway. Only very few people seem to know that their “WhatsApp number” is equal to their SMS/iMessage number… ;-)
Well, I don’t have that option, as I need to be available in the company’s WhatsApp group to get work (⇒ money), which then means that I have to keep my Android phone working, despite it getting worse every update.