When Facebook gobbled up WhatsApp in 2014, everyone assumed that the social giant would wreck the app by betraying its strict privacy standards. It was believed to be only a matter of time before
Facebook began mining WhatsApp user data for all it's worth -- and flooding the app with ads.
Well, it took over two years, but Facebook finally
appears ready to prove the critics right.
Relaxing its own privacy policy, WhatsApp has agreed to start sharing select user data with its parent company. That includes people’s phone
numbers.
“By connecting your phone number with Facebook's systems, Facebook can offer better friend suggestions and show you more relevant ads if you have an account with them,”
WhatsApp’s team stated.
More broadly, “by coordinating more with Facebook, we'll be able to do things like track basic metrics about how often people use our services and better
fight spam.”
But, that’s not all. As WhatsApp mentioned earlier this year, it’s exploring ways to let businesses connect with users. At first, that means banks messaging
clients about potentially fraudulent transactions, and airlines sending alerts about delayed flights.
That all sounds pretty benign and useful, but, of course, it’s just the
beginning.
After all, at some point Facebook needs to start recouping the $19 billion it dropped on WhatsApp.