Google finally acknowledged and fixed an Android bug that caused WhatsApp to gain unauthorized access to a smartphone’s microphone.
If you’re not super familiar with the story, around early April some people began noticing, and reporting online, that the software was using their device's mic without their consent. This issue came to a head on May 6 when Twitter engineer Foad Dabiri noticed WhatsApp had gained access to the microphone on his Pixel 7 Pro at least nine times in one morning. Every time the error occurred, a notification appeared informing him of what happened. WhatsApp’s official Twitter account responded, claiming the problem was caused by an Android bug misattributing information on the phone’s Privacy Dashboard, and then proceeded to ask Google to quickly roll out a fix. It took the tech giant nearly two months to recognize the issue, but fortunately, that day has arrived.
