Stiftung Warentest has taken a closer look at WhatsApp Messenger and recommends changing three standard settings. We have checked the recommendations and give you an assessment: How useful are the suggestions really?
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Stiftung Warentest: You should change these settings in WhatsApp
Stiftung Warentest has taken a look at the WhatsApp messenger and gives recommendations on how you can create a little more privacy. Many users are somewhat careless with the data and information provided via the messenger. Stiftung Warentest is now drawing attention to this and naming three WhatsApp settings that everyone should change.
Profile picture: When setting up WhatsApp, you not only enter your name, but also usually upload a profile picture of yourself. However, that is exactly what can happen from this point on everyone see who has your own number, not just your own contacts. To change this, go to “Account and data protection” in the settings. There you select the “Profile Picture” item and have three options: “Everyone”, “My Contacts” or “Nobody”. You should definitely not choose “everyone”. The decision should be between “My Contacts” and “Nobody”. If you only have friends among your contacts, then “My Contacts” is sufficient. Otherwise, you shouldn’t share your profile picture with anyone – or don’t take and upload one at all.
Last online: Whose business should it be when you were last online on WhatsApp and used the app? Actually, no one. In fact, if you don’t change it, everyone can see it. Under Settings, Account and Data Protection you will find the item “Last Online”. Also change from “Everyone” to “My Contacts” or “Nobody”. We also recommend selecting “Nobody” in the item.
Read receipt: When you receive a message, there are three different checkmarks that send different information to the sender. A gray checkmark means the message has been sent. Two gray ticks mean that the message has arrived. Two blue ticks mean that you have read the message. The latter is not optimal. If you don’t want to send a read receipt, go to Settings → “Account” → “Privacy” and opt out of having a read receipt sent out. This means that blue ticks no longer appear on the recipient. We also recommend this option – disadvantage: you will no longer receive read receipts.
We have summarized more tips for WhatsApp and which settings you should know in the video:
Experts from Stiftung Warentest go one step further
As a final step, Stiftung Warentest (look at Stiftung Warentest) also recommends going to the smartphone settings and revoking permissions there. For example, for location or access to storage or photos. We don’t recommend this, as WhatsApp loses important functionality. For example, you will no longer be able to send photos, use the internal camera or share your location. However, everyone should change the settings mentioned above.
Our tips: This is how you can travel safely with messengers
In addition to the settings mentioned above, we recommend three other measures for more data protection in/with WhatsApp.
Don’t sync address book: When you (re-)install WhatsApp, almost everyone uploads all the contacts stored in the address book, along with their telephone number, to the WhatsApp/Facebook server. From a data protection perspective, this is certainly questionable because not every contact was asked whether he or she agreed to this. That’s why you should avoid it. WhatsApp works well even if you reject the corresponding option during installation – you may have to add new contacts you want to write to in WhatsApp itself once.
No backups in the cloud: They are convenient, but at least theoretically offer hackers another target. This means: If someone gets access to your Google Drive or iCloud, that person will also have access to all of your WhatsApp communication stored in the backup. In a separate article, we explain how you can manually back up your WhatsApp chat histories instead.
Use alternatives: Signal and Threema are less questionable alternatives in terms of data protection, and Apple iMessage is also considered safe – but only when Apple devices communicate with each other. Whenever possible, you should switch to the alternatives mentioned so that Facebook, as a WhatsApp operator, can collect less metadata. Also important: Telegram is not an alternative.
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