WhatsApp rolls out new safety tools to fight scams

WhatsApp and Meta have launched new tools and features aimed at helping people stay safe from scams and suspicious messages.

Among the key updates is smarter group messaging safety. The platform will show users when someone not known to their contacts adds them to a new WhatsApp group.

It will include key information about the group and tips to stay safe. Users can then exit the group without ever having to look at the chat

If a user thinks they recognise the group after seeing the safety overview, they can choose to see the chat for more context. Notifications from the group will be silenced until the user marks that they want to stay.

WhatsApp is also protecting users against scammers attempting to initiate contact elsewhere on the internet followed by messaging on private messaging platform such as WhatsApp.

The Meta platform has tested new approaches to alerting our users to pause before engaging, including ways to caution before starting a chat with someone not in your contacts by showing you additional context to ensure users are making an informed decision.

WhatsApp shared that they have also done work to take down attempts by criminal scam centres, often fuelled by forced labour and operated by organised crime primarily in South East Asia.

In the first six months of this year, WhatsApp and Meta said its security teams detected and banned over 6.8 million accounts linked to scam centres. They noted that they proactively detected and took down accounts before scam centres were able to operate.

To avoid being lured into scams in private messaging, WhatsApp and Meta encourage people to people to stop and think before responding to a suspicious message, particularly from unknown numbers and promising fast money.

WhatsApp and Meta have also encouraged its users to stay safe by customising privacy settings, enable two-step verification, block and report suspicious accounts, reading context cards before replying to an unknown contact or group, to silence unknown callers and to use the official app.

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