After releasing privacy features for group chats and audio messages, WhatsApp is adding even more to the app to let you protect your chats. WhatsApp beta for Android (version 2.23.8.2) has added the ability to lock chats with passwords and biometric authentication.
As always, the feature was spotted by folks over at WABetaInfo. Have a look at the screenshot below.
The app will soon let you set up fingerprint authentication to lock your chats. WABetaInfo says that the app will let you set up a password as well even though it is not visible in the screenshot. We suspect that the password will be used as a failsafe option for fingerprint unlocks.
It appears that the option will be available for individual chats as well as group chats inside the chat info option.
Based on the shared screenshots, it appears that all locked chats will be transferred to a vault, separate from your regular chats, so you only need to authenticate once. However, it is uncertain how WhatsApp will handle the situation if users want to force open the chat after forgetting their passcode.
Currently, it is unclear how notifications from locked chats will appear, how the media shared in these conversations will be treated, and the number of chats that can be locked at once.
Keep in mind that the feature is only available in beta and has not been rolled out to everyone just yet.
