The social media and the instant messaging apps They represent a practical, fast and simple way to share content and get in touch with family, friends, co-workers and students. However, the fact staying connected permanently can also spell trouble.
The possibility of being connected 24 hours a day with just having a cell phone and mobile data or Wi-Fi means that anyone can contact us at any time. The chances of this happening increase if one takes into account that social networks and instant messaging applications show our last connection time and whether we are active on the platforms.
However, both WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, Instagram and Telegram can be configured not to appear online and to maintain privacy regarding our availability and connection times. Next, we will tell you the step by step to configure the incognito mode in each app.
WhatsApp allows you to differentiate between “last time online” Y “online”. Each user can choose to display one, the other, both, or neither. The platform also offers the possibility of choosing who to show this content to. The options are: “everyone”, “my contacts”, “my contacts except” and “no one”.
If you want to share this data, the option to choose is “nobody” in both items. The route is as follows:
– Settings / Privacy / Last time and Online / Who can see my last time: nobody / Who can see when I’m online: nobody.
It must be taken into account that the user who disables different personal options will not be able to access that information from their contacts. That is, if nobody can see you online, you will not be able to see when others are either.
Facebook Messenger allows you to indicate when a user is active on the network or, on the contrary, pause this function. This means that your friends and connections can see or not when you are connected on the platform, or if you were recently.
If the “Active Status” option is enabled, you will also be able to see this information about them. If not, these data will remain hidden. The route is as follows:
– Settings/ Privacy and security/ What others see/ Active status
Instagram allows you to see when the last time a user you follow or have a chat with was online or active. When the option “show activity status” is turned off, you won’t be able to see data from other accounts either.
On the other hand, Instagram gives another option to show yourself active only to those who send messages and are active at the same time as you. The path to configure these functions is:
– Settings/ Privacy/ Activity status/ Show activity status/ Show how many are active at the same time
Unlike WhatsApp, Telegram does not make a difference for the last hour of connection and the “online”. Therefore, the option chosen for one will affect both. In this case, the options available to choose who to share this data with are: “everyone”, “my contacts” and “no one”.
In case of choosing “no one”, the platform clarifies that you will not be able to see the last time or online statuses of the people with whom you do not share yours. Instead, an approximate last time will be displayed (recently, a few days ago, a few weeks ago). The tour is:
– Profile / Settings / Privacy and security / Last time and online
Keep reading
