Whatsapp limits message forwarding to combat fake news

In a move to battle the spread of fake news and spam, Facebook-owned app Whatsapp said it would impose limits on how many groups a message can be sent to after rumours sent via the app led to numerous lynchings in India.

Up until now users could forward messages on to unlimited groups but this will now be capped at 20 groups worldwide, except in India where the limit will be just five.

India is the messaging app's largest market with 200m users. Whatsapp said it was also removing the shortcut button for forwarding messages that appears next to images and video.

These changes come as a response to a series of incidents in India in which a man was killed and two others severely beaten after rumors of their alleged intentions to abduct children spread on the platform.

This has not been the only case and the app has come under scrutiny after forwarded messages on the platform allegedly incited mob-fury on several occasions that led to various lynchings.

The company said in a blogpost that the new measures were imposed to keep Whatsapp “what it was designed to be: a private messaging app”.