{"id":43805,"date":"2021-07-20T16:42:47","date_gmt":"2021-07-20T14:42:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/?p=43805"},"modified":"2021-07-20T16:34:56","modified_gmt":"2021-07-20T14:34:56","slug":"over-2-million-whatsapp-accounts-blocked-for-breaking-new-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.cc\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/over-2-million-whatsapp-accounts-blocked-for-breaking-new-rules","title":{"rendered":"Over 2 Million WhatsApp Accounts Blocked For Breaking New Rules"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press<\/a> – Zimbabwe<\/a>. <\/strong><\/span>WhatsApp has blocked about two (2) million accounts users breaking a little-known rule on the app intended to stop the spread of hoaxes.<\/p>\n

These accounts were blocked in just one month for sending a \u201chigh and abnormal rate of messages\u201d.<\/p>\n

The company said over 95% of the bans were \u201cdue to the unauthorized use of automated or bulk messaging\u201d, not regular texting.<\/p>\n

Almost all the banned accounts are in India, WhatsApp\u2019s biggest market with over 400 million users.<\/p>\n

Bans were triggered when users forwarded messages too many times, blasting past the app\u2019s strict new limit on how many times a message can be forwarded to other people or groups.<\/p>\n

The limit, which was announced in April 2020, is in place to combat spam and the spread of viral rumours, photos and hoaxes. This is a huge problem in India, where many people rely on the app for news.<\/p>\n

Messages containing \u201cfake news\u201d have been blamed for outbreaks of violence and murder across India.<\/p>\n

WhatsApp said in a statement:<\/p>\n

We are particularly focused on prevention because we believe it is much better to stop harmful activity from happening in the first place than to detect it after harm has occurred. The abuse detection operates at three stages of an account\u2019s lifestyle: at registration; during messaging; and in response to negative feedback, which we receive in the form of user reports and blocks.<\/p>\n

It added that it had not read any of the spam messages sent on the app because of its end-to-end encryption.<\/p>\n

More: Express<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Zimbabwe. WhatsApp has blocked about two (2) million accounts users breaking a little-known rule on the app intended to stop the spread of hoaxes. These accounts were blocked in just one month for sending a \u201chigh and abnormal rate of messages\u201d. The company said over 95% of the bans were \u201cdue to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":43804,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,35,9,15],"tags":[1493,2189,2405,19],"class_list":{"0":"post-43805","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-all-news","8":"category-homepage-english","9":"category-miscellaneous","10":"category-twitter","11":"tag-africa-press","12":"tag-africa-press-zimbabwe-2","13":"tag-whatsapp","14":"tag-zimbabwe"},"yoast_head":"\nOver 2 Million WhatsApp Accounts Blocked For Breaking New Rules - zimbabwe<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"WhatsApp has blocked about two (2) million accounts users breaking a little-known rule on the app intended to stop the s ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/over-2-million-whatsapp-accounts-blocked-for-breaking-new-rules\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Over 2 Million WhatsApp Accounts Blocked For Breaking New Rules\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"WhatsApp has blocked about two (2) million accounts users breaking a little-known rule on the app intended to stop the s ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/over-2-million-whatsapp-accounts-blocked-for-breaking-new-rules\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"zimbabwe\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-07-20T14:42:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-07-20T14:34:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/sites\/14\/2021\/07\/img-60f6defa340f9.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/over-2-million-whatsapp-accounts-blocked-for-breaking-new-rules\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/zimbabwe\/all-news\/over-2-million-whatsapp-accounts-blocked-for-breaking-new-rules\",\"name\":\"Over 2 Million WhatsApp Accounts Blocked For Breaking New Rules - 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