Let your Smartphone be Android-based or iOS-based, WhatsApp has become an integral way of messaging, even into a level that it has literally replaced text messaging! Because of this fact, WhatsApp is now being used for an extreme variety of purposes, ranging from personal ones to purely professional ones. Given this fact, showing your WhatsApp app to everyone around you wouldn’t be a good thing, at least when you’ve something confidential / private to hide — after all, who wants someone else to dig into his or her private messages and all?
Nevertheless, because WhatsApp doesn’t offer you an official method to lock your conversation, it’s bad. Indeed, it’s not possible to lock the entire device just for the sake of protecting your WhatsApp messaging and it does not make sense, either. Thus, what we can do is to seek some third-party solutions that can be used to lock and protect every / some WhatsApp messages of yours. In this post, we have listed some methods that will be useful in Android and iOS. First, we will take the case of Android Smartphone, where the method is relatively easier.
#1 Use AppLock
AppLock is an impressive Android application that lets you lock individual apps with ease! It’s actually a free app, but you can upgrade when you need additional privacy and security features. Once you have installed AppLock, you shall be able to select the applications you want locked and you can even set master password and enable enhanced level of protection if you like. Also, there’s an option to hide AppLock icon from your launcher so that others will not know the presence of it.
Well, as in case of WhatsApp locking, you can install AppLock, select WhatsApp in the list of to-be-protected apps list — as simple as that. From then on, whenever you open WhatsApp — or a friend of yours, for that matter —, he will be asked to input the password; you can set different types of passwords such as pattern, text or a numeric combination. Of course, this free Android app is an effective way to protect your WhatsApp messages and it doesn’t want you to confine all the other apps; you can, on the other hand, simply choose and protect.
Get AppLock from Google Play Store
#2 Use Child Lock — Parental Control
Child Lock is yet another application that’s been made for a slightly different purpose; that’s to protect children from accessing particular applications or games or other stuff in the Android Smartphone. Well, when you are looking for a way to protect your WhatsApp messages from strangers, you can use Child Lock — Parental Control by limiting the capabilities a bit.
Since the protection app lets you to be picky as in terms of protection, WhatsApp protection is an easier thing. After you have installed Child Lock — Parental Control in your Android Smartphone, you can select WhatsApp as one of its protectable apps. Once the lock has been enabled, you won’t be able to open WhatsApp until you have drawn right pattern or given the right password, for that matter. The total interface of this app is way too simple that you would love to use it.
Now, we will move on to the iOS version. In this case, however, you can’t just choose an app to protect WhatsApp of yours. On the other hand, you got to engage in some Jailbreaking stuff to get things forward.
Child Lock – Parental Control – Android Apps on Google Play
#3 Using AppLock Jailbreak Tweak
Well, to do this, you have to first jailbreak your iPhone, iPad or any other iOS-based device that you’re using. If you’d be okay with Jailbreaking your device for having an extra protection, it’s okay to move on with the solution, we hope. The reason for including this jailbreak tweak here is the fact that its newest version comes with support to lock each and every app you have installed, quite specifically. Making things quite easier than you guess, this jailbreak tweak is letting you use Touch ID as your password — which means your own fingerprint or any other associated with Touch ID is the option to open the app.
As we come to the case of protecting WhatsApp messages, we can just select WhatsApp app in the list of apps to be protected. You will be asked to provide your password / Touch ID the next time you open WhatsApp — it’s incredibly easier to do, we think. In addition, the jailbreak tweak brings some other features too. for instance, it has an option to disable all these locking stuff once you have connected to a particular Wi-Fi connection; and, Jiggle mode of the same tweak lets you disable or enable the lock through a single button. And, yes, this tweak isn’t limited to app lock only. On the other hand, you can lock a variety of stuff such as home screen, folders you have in drawer and some of notification banners if you want.
Get AppLock Jailbreak Tweak from Cydia
#4 Use Archive Feature
The options we listed above are specific to Android or iOS. However, there’s a not-so-effective option to hide all your messages in WhatsApp. To do that, you can use ‘Archive Conversation’ feature in the app. Once you press it, all the messages in the thread would be moved to the ‘Archived’ folder of WhatsApp, which isn’t seen in the main page. So, if you’re okay with this limited level of protection, you can just use it, without seeking help of any third-party app or tweak. Yet, we repeat, it’s vulnerable.