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If this is the bane of your existence, then help is at hand. WhatsApp

How to stop people from knowing you've read a message

“Yeah, I didn’t get a chance to read it. Seriously”

SOMETIMES YOU JUST want to read a message without people seeing it, whether it’s because you don’t have time to reply straight away or want to leave it till later.

In the case of instant messaging, the majority of services out there allow you to turn off the read receipts  so you don’t see them (or blue ticks) when you look at a message. Of course, you don’t have to do this, but in case you need it, you can hide it for some of the more popular services.

iMessage

If you’ have an iPhone, then you’ve definitely used this at some point among your other iOS friends.

To turn it off, go into Settings > Messages  and you will see the option Send Read Receipts. Switch it off to prevent read receipts from appearing on your end.

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WhatsApp

WhatsApp introduced a feature allowing you to turn off receipts recently and it’s easy to find. Go into Settings > Account > Privacy and you will see the read receipts option at the bottom.

Screenshot_2015-04-17-16-11-09

Viber

Another easy one to find. Similar to WhatsApp, go into Settings > Privacy and you will see ‘Send Seen Status’.

Screenshot_2015-04-17-16-11-18

Facebook Messenger

There’s no way to disable message receipts in the app itself (or the new web app that launched recently) but for the desktop version, you can install plugins like FBUnseen (Chrome and Firefox) or Unseenly (Chrome and Firefox) to prevent these notifications.

Read: These are the best browsers you can get for your smartphone > 

Read: You can now see everything you’ve ever googled in one place > 

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13 Comments
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    Mute Beachmaster
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    Aug 6th 2017, 3:15 PM

    Not a single criminal conviction in this country for over 4,000 recorded cases of FGM.

    216
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    Mute bopter
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    Aug 6th 2017, 4:06 PM

    @Beachmaster: Yo

    4
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    Mute bopter
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    Aug 6th 2017, 4:08 PM

    @bopter: sorry was about to say you can’t catch them in the act, so the solution is to prosecute the parents when they turn up in hospital after it goes wrong. Unfortunately this would then put the parents off going to hospital, and the victim is badly affected even more.

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    Mute Michael Collins
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    Aug 6th 2017, 4:25 PM

    @Beachmaster: yes because religion has an odd fascination with children’s genitalia. And you cant criticise religion

    34
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    Mute marg fitzgerald
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    Aug 6th 2017, 4:30 PM

    @Beachmaster: we are not allowed (by the PC Taliban)to “impose our values” on these wonderful people who “contribute so much to our society “

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    Mute Joseph Rooney
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    Aug 8th 2017, 6:45 PM

    @Beachmaster:
    Excellent Post, Beachmaster. Whether or not your figure is precisely accurate, it is a good estimate, if we calculate proportionally on the basis of the reported figures. There must be at minimum several hundred FGMs in Ireland every year.
    Yet the state does nothing. Children in primary schools get a doctor’s exam at least once a year, unless things have changed since my time. How many doctors have carried out the necessary exam, female doctors if necessary? Or school nurses?

    Not one prosecution. Not a word form the women’s lobbyists, National Council for Women, Immigrant Council of Ireland,. Sinn Fein etc etc. Disgusting.

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    Mute Joseph Rooney
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    Aug 8th 2017, 6:46 PM

    @Joseph Rooney
    Missed two words:
    “if we calculate proportionally on the basis of the reported figures. in Britain”.:

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    Mute bopter
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    Aug 6th 2017, 3:14 PM

    Ireland still allows MGM / circumcision for non-medical reasons. Not as brutal as FGM but still completely unnecessary and a ridiculous superstitious practice. Ban both of them.

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    Mute Cian
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    Aug 6th 2017, 3:25 PM

    @bopter: we pretty much allow fgm aswell. 100s of cases no prosecutions.

    91
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    Mute Abbi Cranky
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    Aug 6th 2017, 4:07 PM

    @bopter: first in with the comment and all. Congratulations!

    Something horrible happens to women where they literally die, but let’s listen to how terrible it is for men.

    This shouldn’t NEED to be said but here I am saying it anyway: you know, you can just show sympathy & support for ending FGM and it won’t diminish the need to end MGM …?
    Yes babies shouldn’t be maimed against their will unless medically necessary- but jeez can you not take over every space with your “BUT WHAT ABOUT MEN”

    Ughhhhhh I despair

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    Mute Veronica
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    Aug 6th 2017, 4:43 PM

    @Abbi Cranky: they can’t seem to help wanting to insert themselves into everything. Such bloody fragile egos. I too despair.

    29
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    Mute Malachi
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    Aug 6th 2017, 5:10 PM

    @bopter: “Not as brutal” is putting it mildly. They’re really not comparable. MGM should be banned, obviously, but I don’t think it’s unfair to say that FGM is a bigger problem.

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    Mute gjpb
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    Aug 6th 2017, 5:12 PM

    @Veronica: considering there are a lot less articles about male health is it any wonder males have to comment on female health related articles

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    Mute Barrys Tea
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    Aug 6th 2017, 5:39 PM
    14
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    Mute Veronica
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    Aug 6th 2017, 6:33 PM

    @Barrys Tea: so of course that means that a conversation about girls can’t remain about girls.

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    Mute Jho Harris
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    Aug 6th 2017, 6:37 PM

    @Veronica: Good to see you and Abbi are despairing, ye both obviously hate men with a vengeance. Nobody is looking for parody for barbaric or was that a Freudian slip about us men when you wrote ” they can’t seem to help wanting to insert themselves into everything. Such bloody fragile egos. I too despair”? Get a life please just for the sake of us men.

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    Mute Dearbhla Russell
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    Aug 6th 2017, 7:00 PM

    @Jho Harris: yes Veronica and Abbey…get a life…do it for the men. Haha!
    Why are we talking about men here again?

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    Mute Jho Harris
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    Aug 6th 2017, 8:09 PM

    @Dearbhla Russell: Because I am a man and I don’t know how to represent women, I am proud to say that I am not in touch with that side of my brain. I respect women but not all of them as you can imagine.

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    Mute Veronica
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    Aug 6th 2017, 8:15 PM

    @Jho Harris: i can indeed imagine Jho ;)

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    Mute Aunt.ie
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    Aug 7th 2017, 8:50 AM

    @bopter: there’s evidence that male circumcision reduces the risk of heterosexually acquired HIV infection by 60% according to WHO.

    http://www.who.int/hiv/topics/malecircumcision/en/

    MGM vs FGM – there’s no comparison.

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    Mute Mary Dunphy
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    Aug 6th 2017, 6:37 PM

    All Governments need to be proactive in the matter of the mutilation of teenagers who have been made citizens of their countries. The dangerous period for these teens is during school holidays when they are brought to ‘visit’ their/ their parents’ birth countries. The detection of those teens who have been taken under false circumstances from the country they live in to be abused in another jurisdiction and consequently their parent’s prosecution should be a priority for all civilized Governments.

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    Mute Micheal S. O' Ceilleachair
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    Aug 6th 2017, 5:33 PM

    FGM is a horrible act. Male circumcision in parts of South Africa occurs in initiation schools. The boys must survive for a month in the bush, many die. These practices seem to be associated with religion based superstitions.

    26
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    Mute Joseph Rooney
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    Aug 8th 2017, 6:48 PM

    @Micheal S. O’ Ceilleachair:
    Nothing to do with Catholicism, That’s one slur you can’t throw.

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    Mute Peter Murphy
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    Aug 8th 2017, 8:41 PM

    All across Europe this horror is perpetrated on young girls to control the female sexual urge. You see it does not do for a young woman who is betrothed to some hairy pervert to get ideas about running of with a male of her own choosing. So FMG.is used as the tool to stop all sexual urges . There are many horrendous consequences attached to this for the Female, but surely the most horrid one is that when she is giving birth this procedure has to be reversed, and when the birthing is over she is sewn up again.
    The savages who participate in this barbarity do not belong in any Country in Europe and should be prosecuted and removed from general society. In Britian thousands of these procedures are carried out every year and as yet not as much as one person has been prosecuted. I do not have any figures on Europe or Ireland but one can be sure it is also happening in both places. In America the much maligned Donald Trump has stated this will not be allowed to happen, and his administration is prosecuting the people who perform this atrocity and also going after the parents who present their children for this procedure. This is the way to tackle this problem, but the problem here in Ireland and all across Europe is the politicos are too cowardly to open their mouths when the religion of peace is involved.

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