WhatsApp has called time on BlackBerry 10 and Windows Phone 8.0, confirming that it will cease supporting the smartphone platforms at the end of the year as it focuses its development attentions elsewhere. The decision won’t mean instant death for the WhatsApp app on those platforms, but it does mean the end is in sight.
WHATSAPP will no longer support older phones by the New Year, forcing millions of people to upgrade their handset if they want to continue using it.
The popular messaging app has over a billion users, but will stop working on certain mobiles because of changes in technology.
The company said in a blog post: “When we started WhatsApp in 2009, people’s use of mobile devices looked very different from today.
“The Apple App Store was only a few months old. About 70 per cent of smartphones sold at the time had operating systems offered by BlackBerry and Nokia."
“Mobile operating systems offered by Google, Apple and Microsoft — which account for 99.5 per cent of sales today — were on less than 25 per cent of mobile devices sold at the time.”
WhatsApp last year announced it would stop running on a variety of models, including iPhones, Android phones and Windows phones.
And as of January 1, the software will stop working on BlackBerry OS, BlackBerry 10 and Windows Phone 8.0 and older.
Support for the Nokia S40 will also stop after December 31 next year, while Android versions 2.3.7 and older will cease to function from February 1, 2020.
The company said: “This was a tough decision for us to make, but the right one in order to give people better ways to keep in touch with friends, family, and loved ones using WhatsApp.
“If you use one of these affected mobile devices, we recommend upgrading to a newer Android, iPhone, or Windows Phone.”
However, the apps themselves will continue to work, though WhatsApp warns that they’ll be on borrowed time. “Because we will no longer actively develop for these platforms,” it cautions, “some features may stop functioning at any time.”
Sadly, switching to a new device isn’t entirely hassle-free. Actually getting started with new conversations from an existing account isn’t a problem: once you’ve installed WhatsApp, you verify your number and your contacts should show up as usual.
Unfortunately the same isn’t the case for chat history, since right now WhatsApp doesn’t support transferring old conversations between platforms.
WEALTH OF INFORMATION
The data transmitted from third sources give Facebook a wealth of information about its users, from which the Silicon Valley titan benefits financially by offering targeted advertising on its website.
FCO president Andreas Mundt said the social network’s advertising space was “so valuable” precisely because it has “huge amounts of personalised data at its disposal”.
Facebook has over 30 million active monthly users in Germany, making it the most popular social network.
The online giant, which has also come under fire in other countries for its use of data harvesting, told AFP in an emailed response that it would reply to the FCO’s questions.
But it said the preliminary report “paints an inaccurate picture”, stressing that Facebook was not a dominant company and that it complied with European data protection laws.
The antitrust watchdog expects to finish its probe by mid-2018, some two years after it was launched.
The FCO does not have the power to slap Facebook with a fine, but the company can be forced to alter or even cease some of its activities.
The German scrutiny marks another setback for Facebook in Europe at a time of heightened concerns over the tracking of personal data online.
On Monday, France’s data protection agency told WhatsApp it needed to obtain users’ permission to transfer some information to its parent company Facebook, and gave it a month to comply.
source : Perth Now & Slash Gear
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