Indian digital marketers and political activists were able to bypass anti-spam restrictions set up by WhatsApp, the world's most popular messaging app by MunsifV AdityaKalra Sankalp_sp More on IndiaElections2019:
NEW DELHI/MUMBAI - WhatsApp clones and software tools that cost as little as $14 are helping Indian digital marketers and political activists bypass anti-spam restrictions set up by the world’s most popular messaging app, Reuters has found.
After false messages on WhatsApp last year sparked mob lynchings in India, the company restricted forwarding of a message to only five users. The software tools appear to overcome those restrictions, allowing users to reach thousands of people at once. Reuters found WhatsApp was misused in at least three ways in India for political campaigning: free clone apps available online were used by some BJP and Congress workers to manually forward messages on a mass basis; software tools which allow users to automate delivery of WhatsApp messages; and some firms offering political workers the chance to go onto a website and send bulk WhatsApp messages from anonymous numbers.
Both apps have a green-colour interface that closely resembles WhatsApp and can be downloaded for free from dozens of technology blogs. They are not available on Google’s official app store but work on Android phones. Reuters was not able to ascertain the overall scale of such activities and found no evidence that BJP and Congress leaders officially ordered workers to campaign this way.In New Delhi, digital marketer Repswal said he would typically charge 150,000 rupees for a month’s service for creating digital content, providing a database of mobile numbers and then sending 300,000 WhatsApp messages.A person can add many mobile numbers in a field and compose messages with pictures.
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