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'WhoApp' Provides Users With Detailed Unknown Caller Information for Free [Updated]

2

2457282

Suspended
Dec 6, 2012
3,327
3,015
The idea is great, but the implementation is not. I am not going to give up my elderly mother or my young children to their "Contact Database."
 
C

coolfactor

macrumors 604
Jul 29, 2002
7,189
9,970
Vancouver, BC
vsthsd said:
No kidding. Their privacy policy:

"When you give WhoApp permission to do so, WhoApp accesses your mobile phone’s address book and collects the names, phone numbers, addresses and certain other information about your contacts ("Contact Information"). WhoApp incorporates Contact Information into a database that it maintains of all its users’ contacts (“Contacts Database “). When your Contact Information is incorporated into the Contacts Database, it is no longer linked or linkable back to you. The Contacts Database is used by WhoApp and by apps that are offered by the company that offers WhoApp (or its affiliates) to fulfill customers’ requests for service and to improve each app’s services for its customers. PLEASE BE AWARE THAT IF YOUR PHONE’S ADDRESS BOOK CONTAINS AN ENTRY FOR YOU, THAT INFORMATION WILL BE DOWNLOADED TO THE CONTACTS DATABASE JUST LIKE ANY OTHER CONTACT INFORMATION."

No thanks - I don't want my friends/family (with address and pictures?) to be entered in here, and I hope they wouldn't either.

Edit: Is this even legal? Sharing personal information of others w/o consent? This is really scary/sketchy stuff. If each phone has an average of say, 50 contacts, and they get 100,000 users...
Click to expand...

Many apps do this, unfortunately.

This part worries me: "The Contacts Database is used by WhoApp and by apps that are offered by the company that offers WhoApp (or its affiliates) to fulfill customers’ requests for service and to improve each app’s services for its customers."

That's a bit too vague for my liking.
 
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nt5672

macrumors 68040
Jun 30, 2007
3,420
7,310
Midwest USA
macduke said:
Every time I get a suspect call, I just copy and paste the number into Google. About 9/10 times it finds the number immediately as a spammer, and I just tap block on the number and never get a call from them again. . . . .
Click to expand...

I just ignore phone calls that don't show a name from my address book. If it is important then they will leave a message and I can call them back. This seems to work fine for both business and personal contacts. If they call and are not in my contacts and don't leave a message then they get blocked.
 
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R

Rigby

macrumors 603
Aug 5, 2008
6,231
10,174
San Jose, CA
ptb42 said:
I hate telemarketers as much as the next person, but I'm not willing to provide all this personal information to someone else.
Click to expand...
You may not have a choice. If one of your friends installs this app and has your contact data on his phone, they already have you in their database ...
[doublepost=1463588057][/doublepost]Can someone explain to me how this app works (technically)? How is it possible that the app gets access to information about calls that I decline? o_O
 
newyorkone

newyorkone

macrumors 6502
Jun 10, 2009
276
250
WhoApp...NoWay
redscull said:
How would you like to get investigated by a government agency when your phone number gets used to make a scammer call? Many of you seem to be under the impression that these scam artists are actually signing up for phone numbers and then using them to place their solicitation calls. That's not how it works. The robo-dialers can pose as any phone number, including yours, and do so randomly. Have you actually tried calling back the number of a robo-dialer? You often reach some bewildered business or resident who has no idea what you're talking about. I've even had a robo-dial that, against all odds, spoofed an actual person from my own contact list.
Click to expand...


Yes. I've had a robo-dialer spoof one of my contacts, and even more audacious, one that spoofed ME. It was my number and the iPhone picked up my contact info of myself w/ photo, which is the contact entry that I share with people. Ridiculous...
 
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B

brueck

macrumors regular
Jun 15, 2010
135
44
I've never understood why caller ID went away. If landlines in the 90s had this feature, why is it no longer available?
 
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B

bondjw07

macrumors member
Oct 10, 2003
46
16
Shame on MacRumors for not posting more about how this tech is working. Skimming the address book is pretty important information and I'm sure there are going to be hundreds of people who download this just because MacRumors posted about it.
 
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nick42983

nick42983

macrumors 6502a
May 18, 2009
549
424
Warsaw, Poland
macduke said:
Every time I get a suspect call, I just copy and paste the number into Google. About 9/10 times it finds the number immediately as a spammer, and I just tap block on the number and never get a call from them again.

What we really need is tougher regulation of phone numbers and the companies or entities behind them. There needs to be a system where a number can get flagged by users, and then a government agency investigates the business or entity. It's incredible to me that there are so many businesses and shady operations able to get an actual phone number that they can then use to spam and scam innocent people. Many times older people (I mean old enough that they get confused easily) are taken advantage of by these people. How can they get a phone number without some sort of deeper information provided to the phone company? To get a phone number, you should have to register a lot of verified personal info, and then be held responsible for what happens on that phone line. It shouldn't be so easy to get a phone number anonymously.
Click to expand...

As annoying as telemarketers are, your solution to give the government more power is A LOT worse. Governments are the most "shady operations" in existence, and you want to give them more power? It's incredible to me. Governments and useful idiots are the greatest threats to freedom.
 
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nutmac

nutmac

macrumors 603
Mar 30, 2004
6,078
7,428
KazKam said:
I have this concern as well. However, in this case, the utility this app provides may out-weigh the "invasion." How else can you build a crowd-sourced uber-contact-list without info from the crowd?
Click to expand...
Agreed. Aside from known contacts in my address book, I would say 90% of the incoming calls are telemarketers or frauds. If it takes an app like this make me trust incoming calls again, so be it.
 
jammasternate

jammasternate

macrumors newbie
May 18, 2016
4
2
The World
Rigby said:
You may not have a choice. If one of your friends installs this app and has your contact data on his phone, they already have you in their database ...
[doublepost=1463588057][/doublepost]Can someone explain to me how this app works (technically)? How is it possible that the app gets access to information about calls that I decline? o_O
Click to expand...

Conditional call forwarding forwards the calls to a number that then forwards the calls back to your phone via a VoIP call, and can do lookups on the Caller ID before sending that VoIP call back to you.
 
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antiprotest

antiprotest

macrumors 601
Apr 19, 2010
4,093
14,473
nutmac said:
Agreed. Aside from known contacts in my address book, I would say 90% of the incoming calls are telemarketers or frauds. If it takes an app like this make me trust incoming calls again, so be it.
Click to expand...

The problem is, they might be one of them or selling to them.
 
E

emcampbe

macrumors newbie
Oct 27, 2014
28
36
Cincinnati
vsthsd said:
No kidding. Their privacy policy:

"When you give WhoApp permission to do so, WhoApp accesses your mobile phone’s address book and collects the names, phone numbers, addresses and certain other information about your contacts ("Contact Information"). WhoApp incorporates Contact Information into a database that it maintains of all its users’ contacts (“Contacts Database “). When your Contact Information is incorporated into the Contacts Database, it is no longer linked or linkable back to you. The Contacts Database is used by WhoApp and by apps that are offered by the company that offers WhoApp (or its affiliates) to fulfill customers’ requests for service and to improve each app’s services for its customers. PLEASE BE AWARE THAT IF YOUR PHONE’S ADDRESS BOOK CONTAINS AN ENTRY FOR YOU, THAT INFORMATION WILL BE DOWNLOADED TO THE CONTACTS DATABASE JUST LIKE ANY OTHER CONTACT INFORMATION."

No thanks - I don't want my friends/family (with address and pictures?) to be entered in here, and I hope they wouldn't either.

Edit: Is this even legal? Sharing personal information of others w/o consent? This is really scary/sketchy stuff. If each phone has an average of say, 50 contacts, and they get 100,000 users...
Click to expand...

Wait...what? So basically, someone can consent to having their contacts uploaded into a database somewhere in a black hole. If someone has my contact info, my information goes into that database, without my consent?

If this is how it works, that seems that it should be illegal, if it isn't already. Even if it isn't, seems like this should be outlawed in Apple's privacy policy. I'm not well-versed in what it is now, but I guess currently, when you agree to share contact information from you phonebook in iOS for something (for example, to match your facebook and phone contacts in Facebook), the app can't store that info....only use it to do the match, and then has to delete it. What is being suggested, again, if this is how it works, seems like a gross violation of privacy.
 
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R

Rigby

macrumors 603
Aug 5, 2008
6,231
10,174
San Jose, CA
jammasternate said:
Conditional call forwarding forwards the calls to a number that then forwards the calls back to your phone via a VoIP call, and can do lookups on the Caller ID before sending that VoIP call back to you.
Click to expand...
Thanks. So I guess it asks the user to set up "forward if not answered" when you install the app?

Given the very vague privacy policy, I wouldn't touch this app with a ten-foot pole, even if it didn't ask to access the contacts ...
 
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