WhatsApp to restrict users from ability to save media in disappearing chats
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In a new change that is rolling out to WhatsApp users of both the latest beta build and the version that is available in the App Store, media saving will be disabled by default for chats with disappearing messages turned on.
The change was spotted by WABetaInfo and is one that will surely help improve the privacy of WhatsApp users — especially those who are so concerned that they use disappearing messages in the first place.
The encrypted messaging service will still allow users to manually save media sent in disappearing chats.
Users on the latest versions of WhatsApp for Android and iOS will now see a message explaining that the "media visibility" feature has been turned off for chats with disappearing messages enabled. The feature was first spotted in development in February.
WhatsApp's disappearing messages feature is designed to remove messages from both the sender and recipient's smartphones after a set period, and users can choose among three options for disappearing chats — 24 hours, 7 days, and 90 days. Messages, images, videos, GIFs, and other attachments sent in disappearing chats are automatically deleted, and the latest update now disables the feature to automatically save all media sent in disappearing chats.
When users tap on the media visibility setting in disappearing chats, WhatsApp now shows a popup notification that informs users that messages in the chat are set to disappear. "For privacy reasons, media is not auto-saved to your phone's gallery. To save media from this chat, turn off disappearing messages," the notification says. Gadgets 360 was able to confirm that the feature was disabled in chats where disappearing messages were enabled, on the latest versions of WhatsApp for Android and iOS.
Users will still be able to select individual images and save them to their Camera Roll on iOS, while Android users on some versions of WhatsApp will also be able to manually save media, according to the feature tracker. Gadgets 360 was able to manually save images from WhatsApp chats with disappearing messages enabled on the latest Android and iOS apps.