Complain from consumer privacy groups regarding Facebook and WhatsApp privacy change is being reviewed by The US Federal Trade Commission

Facebook was started in 2004 in the dorm rooms of Harvard University. Since its inception  Mark Zuckerberg has been very careful in terms of monetizing this platform with advertisements. He always felt that advertisements will tamper with the core value of why this social media platform was created. Advertisements will also reduce the customer experience. Such a great thought has made the social media platform a Unicorn, and it’s become the most viewed app/website with more than 30 Billion visitors.

Today The US Federal Trade Commission is reviewing complains from two consumer privacy groups saying that privacy clauses have been breached. Recently Facebook announced that the 2014 acquired WhatApp would provide phone numbers which will be used to send personalized advertisements to users.

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WhatApp data will be used by advertisers to target the right users on Facebook and Instagram. This move puts both the companies in scrutiny since Facebook should not change any privacy policies without the consent of users. While in 2014 during the acquisition, the founder of WhatsApp promised that data would not be shared with Facebook and everything else will be the same.

Presently WhatsApp is free for use and the only way they can monetize it is by selling data. Whatsapp is making revenue by giving accounts to business so that their customers can communicate easily. To generate more revenue the only other option is to share 1 billion active monthly user data with Facebook.

There are two sides of this story but currently the social media giant own Billions of users critical data. The major reason why people are using Facebook and WhatsApp is for data protection and making digital life private. Change in privacy policies will definitely generate revenue for WhatsApp but retaining one Billion active monthly users can be a new challenge for them.