Meta may release an additional layer of privacy protection WhatsApp which prevents people from taking screenshots of your profile photo on the service.
This upcoming feature was discovered in the latest WhatsApp beta on Android by WABetaInfo. It will be housed in the Privacy section of the Settings menu, according to tomsguide. Since they had access to the blocking tool, they tried to take a screenshot of a profile photo, but they were not allowed to do so. The publication received a notification at the bottom of the screen saying they couldn’t take a screenshot “due to app restrictions.”
As explained in the report, WhatApp introduced the option to prevent users from saving “other people’s profile photos” about five years ago. It was supposed to prevent bad actors from sharing images without the owner’s permission; however, taking screenshots bypasses this completely. WABetaInfo states that directly blocking the ability to take screenshots will allow WhatsApp to “further strengthen the concept of user privacy and consent” on its service. It seems like the bad actors don’t want to use people’s photos for scams, impersonation, or harassment.
Analysis: a small but important problem
Now you might be wondering, “Is taking unauthorized screenshots of a WhatsApp profile photo really that big of a deal?”
Well, based on the brief research we did, it seems like taking screenshots of profile pictures isn’t a big problem for the userbase, but it is a fear of a small group. We’ve seen several posts on Reddit from people expressing concerns about this issue. Someone on the Privacy subreddit even asked if it was possible to find out who took a screenshot of their WhatApp profile picture.
We also found an interesting post on Medium from writer Bilge Tekin who proposed the concept of a Screenshot Restriction feature for WhatsApp in 2021. Tekin’s idea went one step further by preventing screenshots in chat rooms. When he let people try out his idea, the testers seemed to like being able to forbid others from having private conversations.
Granted, none of these examples come from a Meta-funded scientific study or an official poll. To our knowledge, there have been no large-scale studies of this phenomenon. But it could at least give WhatsApp a competitive edge by appealing to this niche subset of the user base. Neither Telegram nor Signal have a feature like this. Plus, it doesn’t hurt to have the option.
To try out the new tool, you must first log in to the Beta program of the Google program and then install the beta version of WhatsApp. The blocking update may not be available to you as only a select group currently has access, but WABetaInfo states that it will be rolled out to more users in the coming weeks.
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