WhatsApp trouble: Swiss competitors are experiencing an unexpected boom - One target group is particularly interested

WhatsApp has come under increasing pressure since its new privacy policy was announced.

A Swiss competitor can now hardly save itself from inquiries.

• Since WhatsApp * published its new privacy policy in January, more and more users have been migrating to messenger alternatives.

• In addition to Signal, Threema can also enjoy a growing influx of new users.

• The Swiss instant message service is particularly popular with some German companies.

Munich - There is a spirit of optimism in the messenger market.

Since WhatsApp published its new privacy policy in January, the pressure of competition on the messenger giant has grown.

The Threema chat app is one of the main beneficiaries.

The Swiss company is particularly popular with lucrative corporate customers.

WhatsApp: After criticism, more and more users are turning away from the app

Uncomplicated use, messages in real time and a free download have made WhatsApp the most popular instant message service in Germany and worldwide in recent years.

According to an online study by

ARD

and

ZDF

on the use of social media, 68 percent of the German population use WhatsApp every day.

An incredible two billion people worldwide send messages via smartphone applications.

But the criticism of WhatsApp's new privacy policy has opened the door to competition from the messaging app.

Messenger services that have disappeared for years have enjoyed great popularity in recent weeks.

In addition to the almost forgotten ICQ and the signal advertised by Elon Musk *, corporate customers in particular have found the Threema messenger service very popular.

WhatsApp alternative impresses with high data protection and confidentiality

"We are barely able to answer the inquiries," said co-founder and Threema CEO Martin Blatter the

Handelsblatt

.

The messenger app now has more than nine million users and 5000 corporate customers worldwide, including the Greens as well as automobile manufacturers.

At its core, Threema has been about ensuring secure communication since it was founded in 2012.

At Threema, the focus is on selling the service, i.e. the app, and not the data as with WhatsApp.

That's why users pay € 3.99 to use the application.

Companies have to pay two euros per user per month.

The WhatsApp alternative Threema does many things differently than conventional messenger services.

On the one hand, no verification with a mobile phone number or email address is necessary to use the app.

Instead, users are assigned an eight-digit Threema number that does not allow any conclusions to be drawn about the identity of the user.

On the other hand, all group and individual chats as well as voice and video calls are end-to-end encrypted.

Security and anonymity are particularly important to the app.

Another special feature of the app is that user data is not stored on servers, but locally on the users' devices.

In addition, unlike other messenger services, users do not have to grant the app access to the address book.

Many companies are therefore convinced of the WhatsApp alternative.

Michael Cabinet, Daimler's Chief Information Security Officer,

told

Handelsblatt

.

"Stable end-to-end encryption, effective data protection and high availability are decisive for a messenger service".

Threema also shines with its unique transparency.

The messenger service recently disclosed its source code.

Threema founder Martin Blatter explained this daring step with the fact that "everyone can convince themselves that nothing bad is going on in the background."

WhatsApp forced update: Worldwide criticism of the new privacy policy

After the announcement of its new data protection guideline in January, WhatsApp fell into a veritable barrage of criticism worldwide.

Above all, the point that users have to agree to the new policy in order to continue using WhatsApp was criticized.

In essence, the new data protection guideline should enable the messenger service to share data from WhatsApp users with Facebook and other group subsidiaries.

After the global criticism, WhatsApp took the first steps and postponed the update by two months.

For users within the EU, not much will change with the new data protection directive.

Because of the European data protection regulation, the company is not allowed to share user data with Facebook or other companies.

Users outside Europe, on the other hand, no longer have the option to refuse data transfer between WhatsApp and Facebook.

(

phf

)

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