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How does WhatsApp earn money?

Comments
  • 20
    Being owned by facebook
  • 1
    They don't
  • 19
    Hamster wheel. They analyze, compile, and sell your messaging habits.
  • 16
    What @bahua said. Content is end to end encrypted, metadata isn't and you can often learn more about a person from metadata than from content.
  • 14
    They sell your shit.
    "There is no free lunch"
  • 0
    Don't they also have a yearly subscription of a few cents?
  • 2
    @Batburger Nope, removed that years ago
  • 1
    @linuxxx oh, good to know I guess😀
  • 3
    It's owned by Facebook so they mine data on you and are rather bad at covering it up.
  • 2
    @nblackburn

    Why would they have a reason to cover it up? Afaik, they're pretty overt about it.
  • 4
    @bahua Because they are doing things most people wouldn't agree with and have been caught on multiple occasions
  • 1
    @nblackburn

    I mean, I guess it's buried in legalese, but they do say clearly that we are the product.
  • 1
    By selling your soul
  • 3
    @IllSlapU I may be wrong and all these might not even be metadata but they sure can be sold to any interested corporate.

    - the habit of your text sending
    - the habit of your calling
    - the frequency and habit of your attachment sending
    Very basic data.

    More useful data
    - your country (from your phone number)
    - your profession or line of business (from your phone number and contacts)
    - your current location (from your connected ISP)

    All of those data are very useful and desirable for certain corporates eg: Telecom.
  • 2
    Remember, if you don’t see any obvious sign of income, you are the income. AKA your data
  • 2
    If you are not paying for a product, then you are the product.
  • 5
    @IllSlapU Metadata is the proof that a conversation happened.

    Sender, receiver, date, time, location, possibly ip address etc. So everything but the content.

    If I call (forgot the title of such persons) a person who helps woman through child birth, then call a doctor and then I'm on the phone with the hospital for half an hour, you don't need much content, the metadata speaks for itself.
  • 2
    @ArchLinux Yup, you often don't need the content, the metadata is mostly enough to gather intel on what's probably being said :/
  • 0
    @bahua Nobody argued that fact but it doesn't make it right, hell even some of it's execs have been whistleblowing on it's practices in social engineering.
  • 0
    You'd better ask how does Twitter earn money
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