WhatsApp 'Delete for everyone' feature update may have rules that beat the purpose

WhatsApp is reportedly updating the ‘Delete for everyone’ feature which allows users to users to delete a message for both the sender and the receiver. You might no longer be able to delete a message without the permission of the receiver.

According to a tweet by WABetaInfo, the update is apparently supposed to prevent any kind of ‘manipulation.’ Don’t you think it almost beats the purpose of the option to delete a message for both parties in the first place? Why would someone approve a message delete request?

LIMITS UPDATED!

WhatsApp has updated the "Recipient limit".
What does it mean? If you delete a message for everyone, but the recipient won't receive the revoke request within 13h, 8m, 16s (maybe because the phone was off), the message will **not** be revoked.
..(1/2)

— WABetaInfo (@WABetaInfo) October 11, 2018

When the feature was first released, it offered users a window of seven minutes to delete the message. Later, the duration increased to 1 hour 8 minutes and 16 seconds. However, with the update, if a user deletes a message for everyone, the recipient will get a ‘revoke request.’ If they don’t approve this request within the time frame of 13 hours 8 minutes and 16 seconds, the message will not be deleted.

The update sounds just as odd, and the time frames that WhatsApp has chosen. Why ‘1 hour 8 minutes and 16 seconds’ or ‘13 hours 8 minutes and 16 seconds’? We suspect this precise number has something to do with convenience, though. One hr 8 min 16 seconds is 4,096 seconds or 2^12. But we’re just speculating here.

When the ‘Delete for everyone’ feature was released in November 2017, it was designed in a way that it raised “ unnecessary questions .” It’s not like the message disappears without a trace. The receiver and sender both see a message confirming that a message was deleted. This would, inevitably, lead to some uncomfortable conversations, because, well, human nature: we’re all super curious about what people are hiding from us; even if it was a ’typo’ sent by mistake, and then deleted.

Asking for permission to delete still feels like too much of a regression, though.