This new flag may appear on some of your messages. It notifies you of a change in the confidentiality of your conversation.
More than four billion users worldwide use WhatsApp Messenger to communicate. This influential platform created by Meta offers many features, directly accessible in individual or group discussions, or in the application settings. And a new icon has just appeared on certain messages. Maybe you’ve already seen it or maybe you don’t know it yet.
This is the case of the strange “flag icon”. It only appears in chats where you have activated the “Temporary Messages” feature, which allows you to erase all content of a conversation after 24 hours, 7 days or 90 days. What is this flag for? It allows you to bypass the automatic deletion of temporary messages. We will first explain to you how to make it appear and then we will tell you the consequences that this may have for the confidentiality of your conversations. How to use the flag icon on WhatsApp:
- First make sure WhatsApp doesn’t have any pending updates.
- Open the app and go to any chat.
- Long press a message or file until it is highlighted.
- As you can see, the flag icon does not appear.
- To enable it, click the contact or group name > scroll down > click “Temporary Messages” > choose an option.
- Send a new message in the chat.
- Click on the message you just sent and you will see the flag icon. Click on it.
- The flag appears next to the message you sent. This means that your message will not be deleted even though you are in a “temporary” message discussion.
- When the automatic deletion time has expired, your message will not be deleted from the discussion.
What do you think of this new function? It’s true that it’s practical when you have a conversation with someone and activate temporary messages. Sometimes we want certain messages not to be deleted, such as an address or a code so that the person can find it. But in another sense, it can harm the privacy of your messages. If you enable the flag, remember that your message will never be deleted while you thought you were in a temporary messages conversation. So use the flag with care. And note that you can remove the flag from a message by clicking on it again and choosing “don’t keep it anymore”.