2024 will not only bring us many new devices, but also applications and services will change forever due to the new Digital Markets Act (DMA). It’s the same regulation that would force Apple to open the iPhone to download apps from outside the App Store or open iMessage to RCS messages with Android.

Also on WhatsApp will experience the biggest change in its history. Very soon we will be able to talk to people from any messaging application without leaving WhatsApp, and this is something Meta has been preparing for years. Now they’ve made it official and explained how it will work.

Talk to Telegram or Line contacts without leaving WhatsApp

The aim of the European Union is to avoid monopolistic practices and make users’ lives easier. Therefore, since WhatsApp is one of the most common applications in Europe, it was decided that it would be one of the applications made available to others.

This interoperability will mean that WhatsApp should allow communication with other messaging appsIn other words, it will make it possible to send and receive messages from WhatsApp with other applications. Obviously, we can also send a message to a WhatsApp contact from Telegram, for example.

This is something we’ve known for a long time, but now it’s WhatsApp engineering director Dick Brouwer who has commented on the function to Wired. According to him, this is interoperability”A solution designed from the existing WhatsApp client-server architecture. This means; The approach we are trying to provide is that WhatsApp documents the client-server protocol, allowing third parties to connect directly to our infrastructure.“.

It’s clear that security is key in all of this. (and one of Apple’s initial reluctance, although it eventually had to accept RCS), and Brouwer himself commented: “There is a tension between providing an easy way to achieve interoperability while protecting the privacy, security, and integrity of WhatsApp.“.

Ultimately this is a more technical issue between different companies and their protocols, but what is important for us as users is that from March we will be able to talk to contacts on Telegram and WhatsApp on other messaging applications.

WABetainfo Screenshots

Initially, we can communicate with messages, voice messages, videos, images and send files. Features like calls and group chats will be added later. It will now be up to users to grant permission to connect to other applications, and the real question is… How will we see Telegram chats from WhatsApp?

As they showed us from WABetainfo a while ago, There will be a ‘Third Party Chats’ tab at the top of the inbox. This is where the messages we receive and send to external applications will be collected. And yes, the point is that these changes will only happen in Europe for now.

Cover photo | Alejandro Alcolea

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