The social media platform-WhatsApp, had informed users, on Wednesday January 6, that they would have to start sharing some personal data with its parent company, Facebook, starting from February 8.
WhatsApp told users they would have to agree to let Facebook and its subsidiaries collect WhatsApp data - including phone numbers and locations - before February 8 or lose access to the app. WhatsApp has since clarified that this affects users only outside the European Union and UK and said that the change "does not affect the privacy of your messages with friends or family in any way
This act, however, has paved way for rivals- Signal and Telegram, as the dual gains more downloads in the last four days.
Signal saw 7.5 million downloads last week, a 4,200% increase on the previous week. Telegram saw 9 million downloads, a 91% increase. India was the biggest source of downloads for both.
Signal received significant publicity following WhatsApp's announcement, with public figures including Elon Musk and Edward Snowden endorsing the app as a WhatsApp alternative.
WhatsApp's rivals got a massive boost after the messaging app announced on Wednesday that it would make users share some personal data with its parent company, Facebook.
Musk tweeted "use Signal," which had the unexpected side effect of sending stock for an unrelated company, Signal Advance, soaring by 11,700% .
The IPOB leader had also announced plan to exit the WhatsApp platform latest on January 14th.
Data from app-analytics firm Sensor Tower shows Signal , a rival encrypted messaging service, saw an enormous surge in user numbers following WhatsApp's announcement.
"From January 6 to January 10, Signal saw approximately 7.5 million installs globally from across the App Store and Google Play," a Sensor Tower representative told Insider.
This represented a 4,200% increase from the previous week.
The encrypted-messaging service Telegram saw even more users flock to its service. In the same time period, it amassed 9 million new users, up 91% from the previous week.
For both Signal and Telegram, the biggest growth market was India. Signal saw 2.3 million installs in India - more than 30% of its total new installs. India accounted for 1.5 million of Telegram's installs, or 16% of all installs.
For Signal, the second-biggest market was the US, where users installed it about 1 million times.
WhatsApp recently, on Tuesday January 12, scrambles to try to allay public concerns about its app's privacy since Wednesday. "We want to address some rumors and be 100% clear we continue to protect your private messages with end-to-end encryption," the company said in a statement on Monday.
"We want to be clear that the policy update does not affect the privacy of your messages with friends or family in any way. Instead, this update includes changes related to messaging a business on WhatsApp, which is optional, and provides further transparency about how we collect and use data," WhatsApp added in an FAQ on its website.
Reviewed by Okenwa Chinedu
on
January 12, 2021
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