WhatsApp just announced that it is restricting message forwarding to combat the rise of misinformation campaigns about COVID-19 and the issues surrounding the virus. With this new restriction, WhatsApp is limiting the amount of groups you can share certain articles with. As long as your articles come from credible sources, WhatApp won’t flag the message and have it removed. Facebook is doing something similar, but instead they are using groups to share reliable information and statistics on their homepage. These new restrictions stem from previous restrictions that WhatsApp had put in place last year. This is comforting to me because the spread of misinformation is what causes chaos and panic especially with how many people are online and can fall into believing the wrong things.
Company Executives said that, “There was a time when users could forward to 256 people at a time, but with recent times the app has been a weapon for misinformation campaigns, which have caused a lot of damage.” This is really scary to me. The fact that so much damage can be done through an App that is supposed to be for connecting with friends is not okay and I am glad that WhatsApp has noticed this and put an end to it.
John Marano's Digital Marketing Blog 