Is WhatsApp chat activity being tracked?

London: While data breach seems to be the flavour of the season, a new app was spotted recently that reportedly tracks a user's chat activity on Facebook-owned WhatsApp.

The app titled Chatwatch reportedly lets people in a user's contact list know when they are available to chat on WhatsApp, whether one's messages are being read, and how often one checks the app, all using WhatsApp's online/offline feature.

As per mirror.co.uk, the app can gain access to the above data even if a user has disabled WhatsApp's "Last Seen" feature.

The Facebook-owned instant messaging app has always advocated user privacy and incorporated encryption of data. WhatsApp is encrypted end-to-end, so the contents of the messages can't be seen.

On a related note, Chatwatch has reportedly been taken down from Google Play Store and Apple's App Store.