With over 1.5 billion users, WhatsApp is one of the most used messaging apps. Find out what features you can use to help keep your child’s personal information private.
The how-to guide looks at the popular global instant messaging app, WhatsApp Messenger.
The application, available to download from the App and Play stores, averages over 2 billion monthly users. The minimum age requirement to use the service is 16 years.
WhatsApp allows your child (aged 16+) to send instant messages to contacts they have added to their WhatsApp account.
Only people who have a WhatsApp account can send and receive messages through the app. Messages can be sent one-to-one or within a group conversation.
By default, WhatsApp identifies whether a message was delivered, read, seen or played. These are called Read Receipts. However, users can disable Read Receipts in WhatsApp settings.
This is a timestamp that shows users the last time your child used their WhatsApp account. Users can customise who can see this in settings.
This can be customised to show what the person wants to share with their contacts.
This tells your contacts if you are online. Users can customise who can see this in settings.
Remember: By default, WhatsApp automatically sets privacy settings to public. If you don’t share your last seen information, you won’t be able to see other people’s last seen information. This applies to Read Receipts and other features as well.
There are four settings to manage what information is shared:
This option will show your information to all users.
Only your contacts can see information about you.
Users can choose to hide their information from individual contacts.
No content will be shown to any user. Your child can change this setting to “My contacts” so that only their contacts are able to see this information. However, you should monitor who they add.
To make sure your child only receives messages from people they trust they can block, delete or report users.
Blocked users will not be able to contact you. Any updates to your status, profile image and last seen timestamps will not be shown. If you have blocked someone, they will not be notified but may still be able to work it out as your status message will no longer be displayed.
Please note that blocking will not remove the contact from the WhatsApp list nor will it remove you from the list on this contact’s phone. To delete a contact in WhatsApp you must delete the contact from your phone’s address book.
If you receive a message from an unknown contact you can Report spam and Block. This will report the user and add the user your Blocked list.
See our WhatsApp step-by-step guide to set privacy safety settings on the social media network. These help keep children safe online while they chat with their friends.
Other customisable features include:
See related advice and practical tips to support children online: