In a recent development, WhatsApp’s latest beta update has brought about a significant change, imposing restrictions on unlimited chat backups on Google Drive. According to reports, this alteration raises concerns about the accessibility and storage capacity of users’ chat history.
Simultaneously, in a separate but impactful revelation, WhatsApp’s strict enforcement of policies has resulted in the ban of over 71 lakh accounts in India during November 2023.
The surge in account bans underscores the messaging platform’s commitment to maintaining a secure and compliant user environment.
Together, these updates shed light on WhatsApp’s continuous efforts to enhance user experience while addressing policy violations to ensure a safer digital space for its vast user base.
WhatsApp Policy Violations Led to Over 71 Lakh Account Bans in India in November 2023
The WhatsApp ban more than 71 lakh accounts in India in November 2023, the company reveal in its latest monthly report.
WhatsApp said that it ban over 19 lakh accounts in India “proactively“, which means the company took action on these accounts before it receive any user reports of policy violations.
Also WhatsApp act on a handful of over 8,000 grievances receive from users in the same month, as per the report.
In its new monthly report publish in compliance with the Information Technology
(Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules (2021) WhatsApp says that it ban 71,96,000 accounts between 1st November 2023 and 30th November 2023.
These were accounts that were register from a phone number with the +91 international prefix, as per WhatsApp.
WhatsApp says that it ban 19,54,000 of more than 71 lakh accounts last November proactively, users didn’t have to report these accounts for violating the company’s policies.
While WhatsApp allows users to report accounts, the platform also employs on-platform abuse detection systems that can proactively detect policy violations.
As per existing regulations, WhatsApp receives grievances from users via emails sent to [email protected] and via mail sent to the India Grievance Officer via post.
WhatsApp says that reports related to account assistance, help with accessing features, service feedback, denied requests related to ban accounts, or accounts that did not violate the company’s terms and the laws of India.
In order to comply with the IT Rules (2021), WhatsApp said it act on 6 requests, one related to ban appeals and the others related to miscellaneous support queries, receive as grievances by the company’s Grievance Officer.
In November 2023, the company receive 8,841 grievances and complied with 8 orders receive from the Grievance Appellate Committee during the same month.
WhatsApp Drops Support for Unlimited Chat Backups on Google Drive With Latest Beta Update: Report
WhatsApp has reportedly begun dropping support for unlimited chat backups on Google Drive for users who have sign up to receive beta updates of the popular messaging app.
The WhatsApp will no longer offer free cloud storage for users on Android smartphones, similar to users who access WhatsApp on iOS.
While the change currently affects beta testers, WhatsApp is also expect to discontinue free storage on Google Drive for all users on Android smartphones in the coming weeks or months.
As per reports, WhatsApp has start to drop support for unlimited chat backups on Google Drive for beta testers on Android.
WhatsApp will display a banner in the app’s settings under Chats > Chat backup informing users that the changes will go into effect within 30 days.
The change could be rolling out to testers in batches.
In November 2023, WhatsApp and Google announce that the firms were discontinuing unlimited chat backups via Google Drive for users on Android.
The change was suppose to roll out to beta testers in December 2023 and to all users in the first half of 2024, as per the timeline given by WhatsApp.
Beta testers who are affect by the change will see a banner informing them that they have a month before chat backups start to count towards their Google Drive storage quota.
The updated storage policy comes 5 years after WhatsApp and Google start to offer unlimited chat backups that wouldn’t take up space on Google Drive, offers 15GB of free storage for all accounts, which is higher than Apple and Microsoft that both offer 5GB of free cloud storage.
This isn’t the first move from Google to limit access to free storage on its cloud services.
In February 2022, the company end support for unlimited “original” photo backups for Google Pixel 3 and Google Pixel 3 XL owners, 3 years after the phones were launch.
Google drop support for unlimited and free photo backups for all users back in 2020, stating that it had over a billion users at the time with over 4 trillion uploads and 28 billion weekly uploads from users.
