WhatsApp Now Hides Your 'Last Seen' Status From Strangers
WhatsApp has made a privacy change to prevent people on the messaging platform from viewing the "Last Seen" status of users whom they have never chatted with, according to the latest report from independent feature specialist WABetaInfo.
As regular WhatsApp users will know, the "Last Seen" status of a contact sits atop the conversation thread, informing you when that contact last opened the app and was active on the platform. Users can disable their "Last Seen" status so that other contacts can't see when they were last online, but the setting's options are currently limited to "Everyone," "My Contacts," and "Nobody."
The latest change behind the scenes is said to be a privacy and security feature to prevent people you don't know and haven't communicated with from seeing your "Last Seen" status and online presence in the app.
According to a response from WhatsApp support, people and businesses a user knows or has previously messaged are not affected by the change.
To improve the privacy and security of our users, we're making it harder for people you don't know and haven't chatted with from seeing your last seen and online presence on WhatsApp. This will not change anything between you and your friends, family, and businesses who you know or have previously messaged.
As WABetaInfo notes, if a user can't view the "Last Seen" of any contacts they've already chatted with, it's because they have turned off the visibility of their "Last Seen" status or they've adjusted it on a contact-by-contact basis, a feature currently available to some users on WhatsApp beta that has yet to roll out globally.
Related Stories
Apple's services and apps appear to be experiencing yet another outage, with complaints on Twitter about problems with Apple Maps, the App Store, Apple Music, Weather, Podcasts, the Apple online store, and more.
The System Status page is displaying outages for the App Store, Apple Music, Apple Books, the Mac App Store, and Podcasts at the current time, as well as issues with Weather, Apple...
There could be a WhatsApp app for iPad coming in the near future, according to WhatsApp chief Will Cathcart. In an interview with The Verge, Cathcart said that people have long been asking for an iPad app, and that the company would "love to do it."
Though Cathcart did not commit to a release date for a WhatsApp iPad app, the Meta-owned company already has the underlying structure in place...
WhatsApp is testing a new feature that will allow users to transfer their chat history, logs, and transcripts between iOS and Android devices, making it easier for WhatsApp users to switch between the two platforms. The new future, in the early stages of development, was brought to light by WABetaInfo, who often shares unreleased and hidden features behind the chatting service. According to ...
WhatsApp has rolled out a new feature to users of its beta app that adds the ability to continue listening to a voice message after you've exited the chat thread it was received in.
WhatsApp has been working on a global voice note player for some time to let users listen to voice messages in the background while navigating around the app. Currently, if you play a voice note and then exit ...
WhatsApp is testing a helpful new feature on iOS that displays profile pictures in system notifications when users receive new messages from chats and groups.
Image credit: WABetaInfo First spotted by app specialist WABetaInfo, the first new feature for the platform in 2022 uses APIs in iOS 15 to add the WhatsApp profile images to notifications in top-screen banners and in the Notification...
WhatsApp has announced it will give its two billion users the option to upload their chat backups to Apple's iCloud using password-protected encryption.
Currently, WhatsApp on iPhone lets users back up their chat history to iCloud, but messages and media that users back up aren't protected by WhatsApp's end-to-end encryption while in Apple's cloud servers.
Given that Apple...
WhatsApp end-to-end encrypted backups are now rolling out for iPhone users, Facebook has announced. Until now, WhatsApp let users back up their chat history to iCloud, but the messages and media contained in the backups weren't protected by WhatsApp's end-to-end encryption while in Apple's cloud servers. Since Apple holds the encryption keys for iCloud Backup, a...
WhatsApp has rolled out multi-device support to all users on iOS and Android, allowing WhatsApp to be used on up to four linked devices without users needing to be connected via a smartphone.
To enable multi-device support, users need to join the multi-device beta. Launch WhatsApp on iPhone, then select Settings -> Linked Devices. Select Multi-Device Beta, then tap Join Beta. Once that's...
Popular Stories
Earlier this week, The Information's Wayne Ma outlined struggles that Apple has faced during the development of its long-rumored AR/VR headset. Now, in a follow-up report, he has shared several additional details about the wearable device. Apple headset render created by Ian Zelbo based on The Information reporting For starters, one of the headset's marquee features is said to be lifelike...
While Apple's early M1-based Macs can only officially support a single external display, there are ways around the limitation. Anker is launching a new 10-in-1 USB-C docking station today which delivers just that.
The Anker 563 USB-C dock includes two HDMI ports and a DisplayPort port, and it leverages DisplayLink to carry multiple video signals over a single connection. Given that this hub...
Apple today shared a new ad highlighting iPhone privacy features like App Tracking Transparency and Mail Privacy Protection that are designed to give users more transparency and control when it comes to their personal data being collected.
The ad revolves around a young woman named Ellie who discovers that her personal data is being sold at an auction house, with bids being placed on her...
The Apple Watch Series 8 could feature an all-new design with a flat display, according to the leaker known as "ShrimpApplePro."
In his latest video on the YouTube channel Front Page Tech, Jon Prosser highlighted information from ShrimpApplePro that suggests the Apple Watch Series 8 could feature a flat display in what seems to be a design originally rumored for the Apple Watch Series 7. ...
Sony this week came out with an updated version of its popular over-ear noise canceling headphones, so we picked up a pair to compare them to the AirPods Max to see which headphones are better and whether it's worth buying the $400 WH-1000XM5 from Sony over Apple's $549 AirPods Max.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. First of all, the AirPods Max win out when it comes ...
With around four months to go before Apple is expected to unveil the iPhone 14 lineup, the overwhelming majority of rumors related to the new devices so far have focused on the iPhone 14 Pro, rather than the standard iPhone 14 – leading to questions about how different the iPhone 14 will actually be from its predecessor, the iPhone 13.
The iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max are expected...
Apple last week demonstrated its upcoming AR/VR headset to Apple board members, indicating that the device is in an advanced stage of development and could see a debut in the not too distant future, reports Bloomberg. Apple has also ramped up development of the software that runs on the headset, with that software expected to be called "RealityOS," or rOS for short. Render via designer Ian ...
Top Rated Comments
I refuse to use WhatsApp despite people looking at me like I'm crazy and saying "What? Why don't you have it? You NEED it. Go download it." I'd love to use Signal but there is very little chance of me convincing friends, family, colleagues to download it when they already have WhatsApp. Even if I do convince some people they would need to then convince the people they know.
Facebook have got their claws into everyone with WhatsApp. It's businesses aswell that use it. So many places now have done away with email/live chat or rely on it less and just tell you to contact them via WhatsApp cause it's the "easiest way".
That all said, people really should be giving other apps a chance. We need to cut out Facebook from our lives.