Meta's WhatsApp is the dominant messaging platform in India - from family and workplace groups to sales pitches. Yet for years, analysts have said it has made only limited progress in turning that vast user base into a meaningful business through commerce or payments.
Late last month, Meta appointed Indian fintech founder Kunal Shah as WhatsApp's global head while investing $900 million in Shah's startup CRED, which operates a members-only platform for consumers with high credit scores.
Analysts reckon the deal was aimed at recruiting Shah - with his reputation for sharp insights into the Indian consumer - and reflects Meta's ambitions to deepen its commerce and financial services offerings.
Read here for more on Shah and this BreakingViews analysis on Meta's push to grab a larger share of Indian payments.
Weeks later, WhatsApp was back in the headlines, but this time for a run-in with regulators.
Authorities that were already cracking down on anonymous messaging balked at a planned feature that would let WhatsApp users reserve a unique username and ultimately message others without sharing their phone numbers.
However, authorities ordered WhatsApp to freeze rollout in India pending consultations with the government. Read more here on the New Delhi's concerns.
"Usernames could support commerce on WhatsApp by enabling businesses to use handles instead of phone numbers," said Prachir Singh, senior research analyst at consultancy Counterpoint Research. But without strong verification and anti-fraud measures, usernames could increase the risk of impersonation, he said.
The government also sent notices to Telegram and Signal seeking details on safety features used to prevent misuse of username-based messaging.
Meta said in a statement that it is building "multiple layers of defense against scams" into the feature, including limits on how many new people an account can contact and blocks on repeated attempts to guess a subscriber's username.
The government's action can be seen as an "overreach", said Sharat Chandra, founder of EmpowerEdge Ventures, a venture building firm for fintechs and startups. But at the same time, WhatsApp and Meta can be faulted for a lack of proper communication around the new feature, he said.
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