> This is why I don't use WhatsApp despite the fact I know many people who use it. To use the app, you have to give access to your entire contacts list. Even if I'm okay with them having my information, I don't feel comfortable consenting for those in my contacts list who don't use WhatsApp.

Fun fact, that has technically been illegal for a while here in Germany. There's quite a few videos / articles on how "Using whatsapp is TECHNICALLY illegal". Of course, nobody really complains, so no legal action was ever taken against any user, but it's still a good excuse for me to say "I'm not installing that. It's illegal."

You don't have to give the app access to your contacts... at least on iOS.

That's what I do. It would be impossible to communicate with friends and family otherwise. I just have to put a little more effort into figuring out who's texting or calling me. The app also still shows me people's (self assigned) nicknames in group-chats.

My only gripe is that I still have to give the app access to my photos. I wish there was a way I could give it sandboxed access to only the photos that it adds to the collection.

You don't need to give WhatsApp access to your photos.

If you want to share a photo you just have to leave the WhatsApp app and start the sharing from the Photos app and select WhatsApp as the target.

Would be nice if mobile OSs had a permission that let apps save photos but to read photos it has to make an api request which opens the system photo picker and when you select a photo the app gets given access to only the photo you selected.

I think Android does/ can do just that? There's a native photo picking intent, and the app just gets back a photo. Whether it was from the camera, the gallery, etc, who cares?

In practice, most apps would rather have their own in-app photo grid. Nothing to do with wanting to violate your privacy, I'm sure :)

The photo picking intent leads to a confusing UI - it's common for phones to have many photo picking intents, so a typical flow would be:

* User clicks "attach photo"

* Phone asks, do you want to use "Photos", "Gallery", "Google Photos", "Camera".

* User wants to share a screenshot - so they don't know which to pick. They choose "Gallery".

* The built in gallery app doesn't show images apart from those taken with the camera. User goes back.

* User picks "Google Photos"

* Google photos only shows screenshots under a confusingly named "device folders" link in a hidden-by-default side menu. User doesn't find that.

* User tries "Photos".

* That turns out to be an alias of Google Photos put there by the phone manufacturer.

* User tries "Camera". That lets them take a picture, or to scroll through another list of past camera photos.

* User gives up.

And we wonder why apps don't use that feature of the platform...

iOS does as well. An app can use the system photo picker to allow the user to select a single/multiple photos without having "Photos" permission.

The problem is that granting full save permission also grants read permission, it would be more ideal if those were split.

I know it certainly has a photopicker but I don't know if you have to have filesystem access to pick one or if you can save photos.

Same in Android. I reluctantly keep Whatsapp installed, but don't give it access to my contacts.

That's how it know what contacts are using it and auto add to what's app if you it add a number that's using it.

It's just convenience. People don't want add users names they just want it to work.

I believe signal are/were working on a way to work out this information without actually sending to the server

The problem is that they don't even give you the option to add the names yourself. You can use it, very crippled, without giving them your entire contact list, but it's almost unusable.

And in fact, they already have usernames (they show them in the Group chats), they simply refuse to show them.

I use WhatsApp without giving it access to my contacts list to chat with one friend who refuses to use anything else. On Android you just have to deny the contacts permission and everything else works fine.