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Meta’s decision to lower the minimum age to use its WhatsApp messaging service is drawing fire from children’s advocates in the UK and EU. The move lowers ages from 16 to 13 in both territories; it went into effect as of April 11. Leading the charge on pushback against Meta, which is also the parent of Facebook and Instagram, is UK-based Smartphone Free Childhood. “WhatsApp are putting shareholder profits first and children’s safety second,” Daisy Greenwell, the group’s co-founder, said in a statement. Government officials also weighed in. Vicky Ford, a Conservative member of Parliament, told Sky News the age-limit reduction was “highl...... Read Full article on HadNews

WhatsApp is set to introduce an expansion of its Chat Lock feature for full connectivity across all linked devices. This enhancement will mean if you lock a chat on your mobile, it will stay that way on WhatsApp for web and Windows, breaking away from the current setup which treats non-mobile platforms as separate channels. The information has been unearthed by WABetaInfo after it delved into the most recent Android beta. In WhatsApp’s previous announcement in November, Secret Code was introduced as a way of enhancing the security and privacy of the Meta-owned messenger app. Soon, you will need the code to access chat logs across vario...... Read Full article on HadNews

This week, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced the government was seeking to strengthen laws to combat doxing. Its ongoing review into Australian privacy law will now be expanded to include doxing, as will other laws covering hate crime and hate speech. Doxing (sometimes doxxing) is shorthand for “document drop” and is the act of publishing identifying material about someone publicly, without their consent. Doxing someone can lead to real-life harms, potentially including job loss, violence against the person, their family members and pets, and serious mental health issues. What any legislation from that review will look li...... Read Full article on HadNews

Meta has announced that it is preparing to launch stricter safety tools to block children from receiving and sending nude images, the social media giant said in a blog post on Thursday. The tool, which will be available to all users but mainly aimed towards women and teenagers, will be an optional setting on both Facebook and Instagram and will also be active in encrypted messages. This follows criticism from the government and police after Meta decided to encrypt Messenger chats by default. It is a feature, Meta says, which is solely designed to protect users from either being sent or pressured into sending nude images, while an addit...... Read Full article on HadNews