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WhatsApp has been up to a lot of changes lately, all aimed at making the application convenient for use by its users by tightening their security measures. Some few weeks ago, it introduced a blacklist feature that prevents users from being added to groups without their permission. It has proceeded to ban users with controversial names in group chats.
According to WABetaInfo, they have been receiving a lot of reports from users that have been banned from WhatsApp. After investigating, it seems that they have a common reason: WhatsApp has banned those users from using WhatsApp because they were in a group that had, as group subject, a malicious name.
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“When these users tried to reach WhatsApp, they have received an automatic reply, that explained that they were banned from violating their Terms of Services and that they won’t reply again,” this according to WABetaInfo.
“So, in this case, someone that was wrongly banned can do nothing and cannot receive the assistance from WhatsApp. People are forced to change their phone number, losing their chat history.”
Since WhatsApp messages are end-to-end encrypted, it is predicted by WABetaInfo that the platform uses an automated system to detect controversial or suspicious activity without actually understanding a specific groups’ chat content. It does this by assessing the group date creation, group subject and even the group description.
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The ban seems quite unfair to deal with by users, WhatsApp has made it possible to prevent this kind of situation thanks to its Group Info Restriction feature. Under the Group Settings menu, the group’s creator can decide exactly who has the power to change the group name by making them a group admin.
