WhatsApp Introduces Built-in Contact Manager for Enhanced User Experience
The New Built-in Contact Manager
WhatsApp is getting a built-in contact manager that lets you save contacts within the app so you don’t lose them if you switch phones.
Addressing User Concerns
WhatsApp typically relies on the smartphone address book to hold and manage contacts, which can be a problem for users who lose their device and fail to back up their phone’s contacts, those who share phones, or individuals managing multiple accounts with separate contacts on one device.
How It Works
- Begin saving contacts on WhatsApp Web and Windows.
- Meta plans to extend this feature to other linked devices.
- Contacts saved in WhatsApp use a privacy-preserving storage technology called Identity Proof Linked Storage (IPLS).
This technology keeps names and numbers encrypted and accessible only to the user.
Future Developments
Jessica Maskell from WhatsApp revealed that this new contacts feature will soon be complemented by a username system, allowing users to operate without needing phone numbers, a trend also seen in other end-to-end encrypted messaging apps like Signal.
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