Comment by BobaFloutist

2 months ago

It's so obnoxious that whatsapp refuses to function if you don't let it scan your contacts.

I genuinely think that should be illegal.

6 comments

BobaFloutist

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pydave  2 months ago

WhatsApp doesn't entirely brick itself. You can send and receive messages, but can't assign names to anyone or start group chats.

I agree it should be prevented. It seems so absurd and is clearly not necessary. Android should have an option to let it see an empty/phony address book, so it can't tell that you've blocked it.

Tepix  2 months ago

I‘m using it without sharing my contacts on iOS

  • extraduder_ire  2 months ago

    That's purely down to iOS's contacts API not telling apps if they have full access to contacts if you refuse or supply a subset. Genuinely wish android's APIs worked the same way.

    I currently store all my contacts in an app that doesn't expose them through the contacts API for this reason.

  • aendruk  2 months ago

    I wonder if it’s improved recently. I’ve been cursing at Facebook for years for holding hostage the ability to create WhatsApp group chats when I’ve declined to expose all of my contacts to it, but I just checked again and there’s a “Skip” button now that proceeds to the phone number UI.