WhatsApp Stops Auto-Saving Media From Disappearing Messages on iPhone

[MacRumors]

WhatsApp is changing the way the platform handles media sent over chats with disappearing messages enabled, reports WABetaInfo.

Going forward, WhatsApp will no longer automatically save images and other visual media to your iPhone’s Photos library if they appear within a chat thread that has disappearing messages turned on. The "Save to Camera Roll" option is now automatically turned off for disappearing chats, meaning images, videos, and GIFs won't be saved even if the general auto-save setting is enabled.

The previous default of saving images from disappearing chats to the Photos app was a discrepancy given the privacy focus of disappearing messages, so the change is likely to be welcomed by those who depend on the feature to share sensitive media.

• How to Enable Disappearing Messages in WhatsApp
• How to Stop WhatsApp Auto-Saving Images and Video to Your iPhone's Camera Roll

Having said that, WhatsApp users can still manually save media that appears in disappearing chats they’ve received, or even take a screenshot of the chat thread, so what you send using the feature can still be potentially saved by the recipient after the message has disappeared.

In another change coming to WhatsApp and highlighted by WABetaInfo, the drawing interface is being tweaked so that the blur tool appears at the bottom of the screen, where it will sit alongside two new drawing pencils.

The change to the way WhatsApp handles media in disappearing messages is rolling out now to all users on iOS, but it’s not clear when the drawing interface tweaks will come out of beta and be made available to the chat platform’s wider user base.

Article Link: WhatsApp Stops Auto-Saving Media From Disappearing Messages on iPhone

 

[BootsWalking]

Is there a way to turn off WhatsApp's "Disappearing Privacy" feature?

 

[contacos]

Apple needs to have a look at WhatsApp and steal how they handle attachments. It is such a mess on iMessage, especially with iCloud Messages enabled. I also hate how it doesn’t automatically save photos to the photo library (shared with you just isn’t the same).

I delete a photo right from the messaging app and it sometimes appears again after closing the app (or it just doesn’t let me delete it at all). I delete an image but somehow they still appear under iPhone storage, i delete all photos in iPhone storage yet it still shows photos in the messaging app. I delete every single photo but iCloud claims i have 3GB of iMessage attachments, yet there is NOTHING. Or I delete all iMessage photos on my iPhone but my Mac shows me images that do not appear for the same conversation on my iPad or iPhone whatsoever.

there isn’t even a button to remove all attachments at once! You literally have to tap on each individually because for some reason swipe to select doesn’t work either, unlike the photos app

 

[Danfango]

This is an example of a privacy-friendly feature, though.

No it's not. It's not even remotely privacy oriented. I prefer to refer to it as digital flashing. For the disempowered at the receiving end it allows people to send stuff to them with no evidence that it was ever sent. For those who can take a screenshot on their phone, it completely removes the privacy stance of it. Thus it's stupid and it's not privacy friendly.

Apple needs to have a look at WhatsApp and steal how they handle attachments. It is such a mess on iMessage, especially with iCloud Messages enabled. I also hate how it doesn’t automatically save photos to the photo library (shared with you just isn’t the same).

I delete a photo right from the messaging app and it sometimes appears again after closing the app (or it just doesn’t let me delete it at all). I delete an image but somehow they still appear under iPhone storage, i delete all photos in iPhone storage yet it still shows photos in the messaging app. I delete every single photo but iCloud claims i have 3GB of iMessage attachments, yet there is NOTHING. Or I delete all iMessage photos on my iPhone but my Mac shows me images that do not appear for the same conversation on my iPad or iPhone whatsoever.

there isn’t even a button to remove all attachments at once! You literally have to tap on each individually because for some reason swipe to select doesn’t work either, unlike the photos app

You just tap to save the ones you want. I'm not sure what the issue is. Literally I don't want my photos library cluttered with every meme my kids send me. If you delete the conversation then the attachments go with it. I have about 6Gb in iMessage at the moment. It's mostly a non-issue for me as I've saved everything worth keeping as I go.

 

[contacos]

No it's not. It's not even remotely privacy oriented. I prefer to refer to it as digital flashing. For the disempowered at the receiving end it allows people to send stuff to them with no evidence that it was ever sent. For those who can take a screenshot on their phone, it completely removes the privacy stance of it. Thus it's stupid and it's not privacy friendly.



You just tap to save the ones you want. I'm not sure what the issue is. Literally I don't want my photos library cluttered with every meme my kids send me. If you delete the conversation then the attachments go with it. I have about 6Gb in iMessage at the moment. It's mostly a non-issue for me as I've saved everything worth keeping as I go.

I guess my relatives are too used to WhatsApp. They never save anything in messages because they are too used to having everything saved to Photos automatically and then delete the ones they don't need. I spent, what feels like half my Christmas break deleting iMessage attachments from my relatives filled up phones because they just refuse to delete anything during the year, not knowing / remembering what and if they already saved them to Photos or not. This results in like 20 GB+ iMessage libraries or worse, having saved stuff twice (in the Photos app and iMessage).

this badly needs a DELETE ALL button:

also here: or at least a swipe to select gesture like in the Photos app

 

[chucker23n1]

No it's not. It's not even remotely privacy oriented. I prefer to refer to it as digital flashing. For the disempowered at the receiving end it allows people to send stuff to them with no evidence that it was ever sent. For those who can take a screenshot on their phone, it completely removes the privacy stance of it. Thus it's stupid and it's not privacy friendly.

That's quite a cynical read. I imagine such scenarios happen, but "I want to share something but with a time limit" has tons and tons of users who aren't malicious like that at all; they really just want stuff to remain private.

 

[Danfango]

That's quite a cynical read. I imagine such scenarios happen, but "I want to share something but with a time limit" has tons and tons of users who aren't malicious like that at all; they really just want stuff to remain private.

I have a friend who gets self-expiring dick pictures at least once a week.

It enables those people somewhat.

There is no valid usage for "this message will self destruct" that I can think of.

 

[Danfango]

I guess my family is so used to WhatsApp. I spent what feels like half my Christmas break going through my relatives phones to free up space because they have every photo saved in the photo app as well as the iMessage app itself and they have lost track on what they already saved and thus refuse to delete anything from iMessage and end up with an iPhone that has run out of space because of 20GB iMessage libraries because they have everything saved twice. That’s what I like about WhatsApp. Everything is automatically saved to the photo app and you can just wipe all attachments from WhatsApp with one tap instead of having everything stored twice. Why would I store photos in the messaging app? That’s what „Photos“ is for no?

this badly needs a DELETE ALL button:

...

also here: or at least a swipe to select gesture like in the Photos app

...

Yeah agree about the delete all button.

As for deleting stuff from relatives' phones at Christmas, my ex-wife's uncle asked me to have a look at his crapware ridden Windows box one Christmas. I spent 7 hours working on that computer battling malware and porn on a spooge and KFC encrusted keyboard away from the family.

When I got home I realised I'd burned up my family time on the day and I sent him an invoice.

No one has ever asked me to help with their IT problems since!

 

[contacos]

That's quite a cynical read. I imagine such scenarios happen, but "I want to share something but with a time limit" has tons and tons of users who aren't malicious like that at all; they really just want stuff to remain private.

I like it too because I do not need every single screenshot or Meme someone sent me stored forever which is the case on iMessage unless you go in and delete them immediately. Otherwise you end up with a filled up library and need to select all images ONE BY ONE

 

[sw1tcher]

There is no valid usage for "this message will self destruct" that I can think of.

Jim Phelps would disagree.

 

[Danfango]

Jim Phelps would disagree.

View attachment 1988436

Good reference ?

 

[bunty]

I've never used WhatsApp, but in Settings > Messages > Keep Messages I have my phone set to 30 days. I just save, manually, what I want that people send me and after 30 days stuff is automatically deleted. If I didn't bother to save it after 30 days, that's on me. But I honestly don't fully understand what WhatsApp was doing or not doing, I guess the difference is Messages doesn't have "disappearing" images and WhatsApp does?

 

[nvmls]

Apple needs to have a look at WhatsApp and steal how they handle attachments. It is such a mess on iMessage, especially with iCloud Messages enabled. I also hate how it doesn’t automatically save photos to the photo library (shared with you just isn’t the same).

I delete a photo right from the messaging app and it sometimes appears again after closing the app (or it just doesn’t let me delete it at all). I delete an image but somehow they still appear under iPhone storage, i delete all photos in iPhone storage yet it still shows photos in the messaging app. I delete every single photo but iCloud claims i have 3GB of iMessage attachments, yet there is NOTHING. Or I delete all iMessage photos on my iPhone but my Mac shows me images that do not appear for the same conversation on my iPad or iPhone whatsoever.

there isn’t even a button to remove all attachments at once! You literally have to tap on each individually because for some reason swipe to select doesn’t work either, unlike the photos app

They do that on purpose to eat your storage sadly.

 

[cyanite]

There is no valid usage for "this message will self destruct" that I can think of.

Well, if you can’t think of it, I guess it doesn’t exist

 

[KALLT]

I've never used WhatsApp, but in Settings > Messages > Keep Messages I have my phone set to 30 days. I just save, manually, what I want that people send me and after 30 days stuff is automatically deleted. If I didn't bother to save it after 30 days, that's on me. But I honestly don't fully understand what WhatsApp was doing or not doing, I guess the difference is Messages doesn't have "disappearing" images and WhatsApp does?

What Messages and WhatsApp do is not strictly the same. Messages just purges its message history after 30 days or 1 year, without affecting the recipient (they can choose to keep all messages or choose a different interval). WhatsApp does not have this feature. WhatsApp instead uses self-expiring messages that get deleted for both the sender as well as the recipient after the timer you set beforehand expires (1 day, 7 days or 90 days), but you cannot change it after the message was sent.

 

[sos47]

i turned disappearing messages on a while ago because i dont wont that others flood my iphone with their attachments. i can’t understand why i should automatically save content to my photos lib. even if i get some nice family pics the resolution is really bad, i always demand sending interesting content with iMessage

 

[ThatGuyInLa]

I like how Apple handles it. I always set my iMessages to expire after 30-days and I use the cloud option. I save only images I want, manually. Works perfectly. Keeps things tidy.

 

[Damian83]

From when whatsapp desktop can be used without phone, it became buggy as hell. Sync is ridicolous, sometimes the messages history on desktop, is blank. i have to re-open app and the messages re-appear. Sometimes nothing syncs at all. I don't understand how a company with billions of funds can't make functioning a feature present from years, on apps with much less money to invest. The same goes for apple: still no function to delete messages also for recipients, on imessage. Ridicolous