WhatsApp users can now also chat with users of other messengers via the app. What sounds like a cool feature is actually rubbish in practice.
Sometimes life is unnecessarily complicated. Anyone who has an email address can use it to communicate with all other users who also have an email address. The same goes for good old telephone and cell phone numbers.
This is not the case with messengers.
The providers have built silos here, which leads to eternal discussions about whether it is better to use WhatsApp, Signal, Threema or one of the following numerous other messengers should use. Here comes a new WhatsApp function located that was offered to me aggressively in the settings these days.
The so-called Third Party Chats promise that as a WhatsApp user you can stay in touch with people who use other messengers. Sounds great, but the function is rubbish.
Messenger compatibility: EU requirement
The fact that you could open yourself up to competition is not based on the crap that WhatsApp itself has. Rather, the EU has created the necessary pressure here with the Digital Markets Act (DMA) – and in this regard I think opening up messengers is a good thing.
But WhatsApp implements this really badly. As of today, the function exists, but you can only interact with a messenger. But since Signal or Threema declined due to data protection concerns, there is currently only one relatively unknown app in the selection list.
WhatsApp users can have conversations with BirdyChat users. Have you never heard of it? No wonder, this is more of a special app for professional communication that starts at $5 per month.
Useless feature of WhatsApp
Nevertheless, WhatsApp slaps this useless function on my screen. The novelty is advertised at the top of the settings. Of course I couldn’t resist and tried the setup.
In the first run this only resulted in an error message. A day later the setup actually worked. Now I could potentially actually chat with BirdyChat users if I knew someone who used the app.
The bottom line is that this shows once again that Well-intentioned does not automatically mean well-done is. After all, the chats are supposed to be end-to-end encrypted, so the providers cannot read them.
For now, there are only 1:1 chats and the function is limited to the apps for Android and iOS; desktop versions or WhatsApp on the tablet cannot do anything with third-party providers. And of course: for this to be possible at all, you need a cell phone number from the EU.
WhatsApp also seizes the opportunity numerous metadata from the third-party messengerssuch as online status, IP addresses or location. Honestly, if I’m willing to feed this data, I might as well use WhatsApp.
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