Steps To Delete Your WhatsApp Account Safely
In case you are also one of those people who are worried due to the new changes in the privacy policy of WhatsApp and plan on switching to a different messaging app, then you might have been wondering about how to properly delete your WhatsApp account and get back all the data.
Well, no need to think anymore, we are here to offer a helping hand. Users just need to follow some simple steps to delete their WhatsApp account and gather all of their data. Although users might have to wait for a while for data collection, as the company may take a few days before sending the report. Users can also choose to manually export all the data.
Steps to deactivate or delete WhatsApp accounts on Android
Step 1: Users can open WhatsApp and tap on the three-dotted icon located on the top right corner.
Step 2: Next, tap on Settings and go to Account and then tap on Delete my account option.
Step 3: Users will be asked to enter their phone number and then, they can tap on Delete My Account.
Step 4: Users will be further asked to select a reason as to why they want to delete their account.
Step 5: They can select a reason and then tap on Delete my account.
Steps to delete or deactivate WhatsApp account on iOS
Step 1: Open WhatsApp account oniOS device and go to Settings > Account > Delete My Account.
Step 2: Users can then enter their mobile number and tap on Delete My Account.
What happens when a user deletes their WhatsApp account?
The company announced that once a user deletes their WhatsApp account, they will be unable to gain access to it and will further need to create a new account. It may take up to 90 days to delete all the WhatsApp information.
WhatsApp has officially stated “Copies of your information may also remain after the 90 days in the backup storage that we use to recover in the event of a disaster, software error, or other data loss event. Your information isn’t available to you on WhatsApp during this time. Copies of some materials such as log records may remain in our database but are disassociated from personal identifiers.”
How do users find out the data collected by WhatsApp?
WhatsApp permits its users to submit a request to review all the data that WhatsApp has collected ever since the users joined the platform. Once the request is sent, users will be provided with a link to download data. This process may take up to three or more days as WhatsApp will have to compile all the data of the user. To be able to do this, users will have to ensure that they are using the latest version of the app.
Step 1: Open your account and go to the settings panel.
step 2: Tap on the ‘Account’ section and then tap on ‘Request account info’ option.
Step 3: Then, tap on the ‘Request’ button and your request will then be sent to the company.
After the report is ready, the app will forward a notification to the user. To access the report, users will have to follow the same steps. Users can find the report in the ‘Request account info’ section and press the download button. Subsequently, a zip file with the report will be downloaded to the user’s smartphone.
Steps to manually download WhatsApp chats and media?
In case, the user wants to export some personal chats, then can follow these steps.
Step 1: Open the chat of any individual and tap on the three-dotted button.
Step 2: Tap on More and select Export chat.