The privacy controls have come by popular demand on the WhatsApp app, still today the most used app in Italy for chatting and sharing emotions with all our friends. The new privacy controls could be difficult to understand for those who are not experts or for those who underestimate the topic: since privacy is very important nowadays, it is worth taking a few minutes to relax and browse the options offered by WhatsApp , so as to significantly increase security and privacy when we chat with other people (especially if we have annoyances or people who always send messages as soon as we are online).Hiding personal data on WhatsApp is very simple, since most of the options are accessible from a single menu. In the following guide we will show you in detail how to hide personal data on WhatsAppso you can continue using the messaging app without the fear of being invaded by unwanted messages and also hide our activity when we are online, from all or only some contacts.
READ ALSO: Ways to read Whatsapp messages without opening them (and letting the sender know)
General privacy settings
Most WhatsApp privacy settings can be managed by opening the three dots at the top right (on Android) or the menu Settings (on iPhone) and opening the path Settings -> Accounts -> Privacy.
In this menu we can decide how to adjust the privacy for each WhatsApp function, so as to make it more permissive or restrictive based on the type of contacts we chat with every day. Specifically, we can set the privacy for the functions:
- Last Access: allows you to set the users who can view the date and time of the last access made. We can set it up Nobody to hide from everyone when we were last logged in, but users will still be able to see when we are online at that precise moment. See also how to be offline on Whatsapp and hide the last login.
- Profile picture: with this command we can decide who will be able to see our profile picture. Again we can set it to Nobody to hide your profile photo.
- Info Whatsapp: We use this menu to hide personal information added to the profile.
- Whatsapp status: even our status, that is what is published in Whatsapp as a story, can be hidden from prying eyes.
- Read confirmations: by disabling the switch in this item we will be able to send or receive read receipts in individual chats. Confirmations for group chats will still be active. See also how to disable the read receipt (blue ticks) on WhatsApp
- Groups: this menu allows you to choose who will be able to add us to groups. Basically it is better to leave this possibility only to contacts, but we can also set some exceptions.
- Real-time location: this menu allows you to choose who can automatically access the position in real time (when active). We recommend setting it to Nobody for maximum privacy.
- Contacts blocked: in this menu we find the contacts we have already blocked, as well as being able to block new contacts.
- Fingerprint lock: one of the most interesting news of WhatsApp, which we will talk about in the dedicated chapter.
Using properly the menus seen above we will be able to hide personal data on WhatsApp and to limit information on what we do when we are online to a minimum, as well as being able to block some dangerous operations (such as adding to groups we do not know).
How to set up fingerprint lock
To significantly increase privacy when we use WhatsApp, we can set an app lock, which can only be removed with the fingerprint reader or other biometric access types (such as Face ID on Apple). If our device is already ready (ie we already use the fingerprint or the face to unlock the phone) let’s go to the menu Settings -> Accounts -> Privacyscroll to the end of the items, press on Fingerprint lock and activate the switch on the screen.
After pressing on the switch we confirm the fingerprint or look in the front camera to enable the lock. New privacy items will also be unlocked: we can in fact choose the waiting time before activating the block and whether or not to view the content of the WhatsApp notifications when blocked.
To learn more we can read our guide Activate fingerprint lock on WhatsApp, Telegram and Messenger.
How to mute a group or a single user
Another privacy option that should not be underestimated is the possibility of mute a group or a single chat, so as not to be disturbed by annoying users or by particularly large and “chatty” groups. To proceed, open the single chat or group chat, press the top right on the menu with the three dots, select the item Turn off notifications and finally we choose when to stop receiving notifications.
In the window that appears we can choose whether to silence notifications for 8 hours, for 1 week or forever and, separately, we can choose whether or not to show notifications for events or important situations. We would like to clarify that, if in a group chat we are tagged (ie the @ key followed by our contact name will be used), the notification will still be reported by the phone.
To completely turn off notifications on phones and WhatsApp, we can read our guides Block Android notifications or limit them only for some apps e Mute Whatsapp and disable notifications on Android and iPhone.
Conclusions
Many users underestimate the privacy options of WhatsApp, leaving everything active or with too “free” permissions: if we have never acted before on the privacy of the messaging app, we can use this guide to hide personal data on WhatsApp and to mute or block users or group chats that are too annoying.
Still on the subject of privacy and blocks on WhatsApp, we can read our guides Block unknown numbers on Whatsapp e Block people and contacts on Whatsapp.
If, on the other hand, we want to find out if a user has blocked us on WhatsApp, just read our in-depth analysis Find out who blocked me on Whatsapp.