WhatsApp imposes new limit on message forwarding to curtail spread of fake news

User are now allowed to forward a message to only one chat at a time

WhatsApp is imposing new restrictions on forwarding of messages on its platform in efforts to curtail the dissemination of misinformation and false stories related to coronavirus outbreak.

The company, which is owned by Facebook, announced today that its user on its platform will now be able to forward a message to only one chat at a time, rather than five. The update will make it more difficult for users to circulate messages en masse, thus helping in limiting the amount of fake news being spread using this popular private messaging service.

"We've seen a significant increase in the amount of forwarding which users have told us can feel overwhelming and can contribute to the spread of misinformation," the company stated in a blog post.

"We believe it's important to slow the spread of these messages down to keep WhatsApp a place for personal conversation."

WhatsApp says it's concerned about the fact that messages can be spread far and wide on its platform. And because the chats are end-to-end encrypted, the company has no idea what content users are sharing on the platform.

This has become specifically significant at present time when coronavirus outbreak has created panic among people worldwide.

For several years after its launch, WhatsApp provided users the facility to forward a single message to as many as 256 subscribers. Moreover, such messages were not labelled as forwards.

But, abuse of this feature led to a crisis in India, where many people starting using WhatsApp to spread hate speech which led to cases of mob violence.

In 2018, WhatsApp announced that it was taking steps to cut down on the amount of spam messages that were encouraging recipients to forward them to other contacts.

Last year, the company introduced a limit on message forwarding, allowing users to forward a single message to only five people at a time.

According to WhatsApp, the restriction helped to slow the rate of message forwarding on the platform, and led to 25 per cent decrease in message forwards around the world.

Last year, WhatsApp also started adding a "Frequently Forwarded" label to some messages to enable users to identify those that didn't originate from a close contact.

WhatsApp says it is now working directly with government agencies, ministries and NGOs in many countries to help connect people with accurate information on coronavirus pandemic.

"Our teams are hard at work to keep WhatsApp running reliably during this unprecedented global crisis," the company said.

"We'll continue to listen to your feedback and improve ways for people to share with each other on WhatsApp."