While we have been talking about how Houseparty users have been informing others about hacking attempts on them, it was later found out that the company believes it to be a smear campaign.
They have even announced a bug bounty in order to award anyone who gives them information about the campaign and the amount is no less because you can earn a million dollars for the same. This gives us trust that the company is serious about its claims and that it might be a campaign to bring down the app’s popularity after all.
But a new issue is still present with the Houseparty app and that is the issue of privacy. For example, the experts say that the Houseparty app collects too much information from its users which might not be good for everyone. One report mentions that experts believe users could inadvertently be sharing more personal data than they realize.
“Anybody who decides to use the Houseparty application to stay in contact during quarantine needs to be aware that the app collects a worrying amount of personal information,” says an expert. “This includes geo-location data — which could, in theory, be used to map the location of each user.”
Since everyone is at home right now and video calling is just too boring after the first time, people have been downloading the Houseparty app to have fun even while staying at their respective homes.
Experts also say that “If the pandemic continues for any prolonged period, the chances that apps like this could be placed under surveillance to monitor how COVID-19 is spreading is a very real possibility,”
It is worth noting that Houseparty app which was developed in 2016, was bought in 2019 by Fortnite maker Epic Games. At that time, the app’s CEO said that Houseparty and Epic “have a common vision to make human interaction easier and more enjoyable, and always with respect for user privacy.”
