A new privacy-focused feature for Android users is reportedly being developed by WhatsApp and is designed to help users spot potential scams before interacting with them. The feature, known as Scam Alert, will help WhatsApp users analyse messages from unknown senders, and it will also flag suspicious conversations, according to a feature tracker. It works entirely on-device and preserves the same end-to-end encryption found in standard WhatsApp conversations.
The Scam Alert feature was found in the Google Play Store’s WhatsApp beta for Android app version 2.26.22.2, according to feature tracker WABetaInfo, and it is presently being developed and is anticipated to be released alongside an upcoming version of the WhatsApp app for Android.
The way the new feature works is that when a message from an unknown sender looks suspicious or questionable, the feature is supposed to alert consumers. The feature will give contextual information to help users determine whether the sender is trustworthy rather than automatically blocking the discussion. The feature tracker also states that WhatsApp will indicate it by saying that “this may be a scam” in a warning banner that appears within the chat.
The reports also say that users would have two choices: either ban and report the sender or carry on with the conversation if they think the message is genuine.
One noteworthy characteristic of Scam Alert, according to the feature tracker, is its implementation that prioritizes privacy. Similar to WhatsApp’s voice transcript feature, Scam Alert is touted to process messages entirely on the user’s device. This implies that discussions are never examined or kept on external servers.
Users’ interactions will reportedly not be accessible to the corporation throughout the scam detection procedure. In addition, the source also confirmed that the Scam Alert will run in the background without any noise. This implies that whether the functionality is activated on a recipient’s device will remain unknown to other users.
A transparency component is also said to be in development for WhatsApp’s Scam Alert feature, which will allow users to review local logs showing when the feature was activated. These records will be stored on-device and are not shared with WhatsApp. In the event that no suspicious activity is detected over a selected period, the report will likely show that no scam-related alerts were generated. This means that the same way images, voice notes, and stickers are stored on the device is also the same way the feature will save records on the device, which can be either on the attached memory device (external) or the internal memory of the device.
The Scam Alert function is optional and will be turned off by default, according to the feature tracker. This means that the user has the option to either set it up by turning it on or not turning it on. From the app’s settings section, users who want to utilize it might be able to manually enable it. There is no official release date for the feature because it is currently in development.
Currently the feature is actively under the development phase. Also, the feature has not been released to public beta testers yet. It is also to be noted that WhatsApp is yet to announce an official rollout timeline, the tool is anticipated to arrive in a future Android update.