Beware! Fake version of WhatsApp found on Google Play Store

A fake and possibly malicious version of Facebook-owned WhatsApp was found lurking on Google Play Store as “Update WhatsApp Messenger” with developer name as ‘WhatsApp Inc*’.

When IANS checked it on the Play Store, we found the app has been downloaded up to 5,000 times. There is another version under the same name which has a million The original WhatsApp has 1 billion downloads.The existence of the shady software was first highlighted by the popular WhatsApp change tracking website WABetaInfo, via Twitter user @MujtabaMHaq, IB Times reported late

on Thursday.

“DON’T DOWNLOAD THIS APP! IT’S FAKE!

WhatsApp Business is not officially available yet for all,” the WABetaInfo social media account tweeted to its 30,000 followers.

It added: “Check only official channels to download WhatsApp Business in future.”

WhatsApp Business is yet to launch as a standalone service.

Some users took to Twitter to highlight problems with the messaging app. The Facebook-owned company later released a statement saying issue has been fixed, and apologised for any inconvenience.

According to downdetecor.com, 46 per cent users complained of problems with the connection while 41 per cent reported issues with sending or receiving messages. About 12 per cent WhatsApp had problems with ‘Last seen’ feature of the service