How to know if someone is stalking you on WhatsApp?

The present version of WhatsApp, I feel there is no pucca way to know if somebody is stalking you. But you can observe who is following you constantly on your WhatsApp can be understood by following the following points.

1. Observe who is constantly online when you are online as well.
2. Observe when anybody is sending you a message the moment you are online.
3. Observe any person consistently watching your status updates and comments on that.
4. Observe any person observing and commenting on changes in your profile picture.
5. Observe the tick sign indicating the delivery of your message turns blue immediately you sent that person a
message
6. Observe which person is the first to view your status updates
If all the answers for the above are the same person, he is the person may be stalking your account.

To avoid this problem one can follow the following points.

1. Change options for who can view my profile picture. You can set Nobody as an option or my contacts. Then only your contacts can see the profile picture or nobody can see it as per your option. There is another option all. If you go for it everybody can see your profile picture.
2. Switch off read receipts. You can disable read receipts by going to your settings.
3. Hide last seen: You can go to your settings and then to accounts and then privacy. In that, for this, there will be three options Nobody, contacts, all. You can select as per your choice.
4. Manage Group settings. As mentioned you go to privacy settings and choose one from the four options as you like Everyone, My Contacts, and My Contacts Except some.
5. Block contacts: This also you can do by going to the chats of the person whom you want to block and block him.
If you take the above steps you can avoid somebody stalking you.

When we talk about stalking, it literally means following a person and having a close look at him/her. Stalking on social medial or what you call Cyberstalking is a way of using the Internet to keep a close watch on someone by using any electronic means like mobile or smartphone, laptop, desktop, tab, etc. Stalking can be with two motive, first, when you like or love a person and would like to know more about him/her. Secondly, it can be to harass, defame, or collect false allegations about that person. Normally, a stalker may be a known person, within your friend circle or it can even be a stranger.

Some of the ways to know if some is stalking you on WhatsApp are:
- You can view that person always with a green dot i.e. online 24x7.
- You get a "Hi" or any other message, the time you get online or is logged into WhatsApp.
- They will be the first to like, comment or view your status, uploads or wish you.
- You may receive a message from them about your status or upload.
- The message or post forwarded to them is viewed within seconds and you can know about it by the 2 blue tick.

Some of the ways to stop stalking are:
i) Hide your Last Seen: This is an important feature of WhatsApp as it helps us to know about when the other person was online. As it is good for people, it is also an advantage for the stalkers to know about your last login time. You can easily choose to close this and this will block others to know your last login status. As it blocks the stalkers, it will also close your way of knowing about others' last login timing. For activating this setting, You need to open your account option, choose the privacy option, choose the last seen option (Everyone, My Contacts, and Nobody). You have hidden your last seen option.

ii) Switch off Read Receipts or blue ticks: As it is a blessing to know that your message is read by the person you have sent, it is also an option for the stalker to know that you have read their message and help them to send more message. You can restrict it by disabling the option but be known that by disabling it, you too won't be able to know others' read receipts. For disabling this option, go to my account option, choose the privacy option, choose more options and in it toggle off the Read receipts option.

iii) Hide WhatsApp profile photo: Many of us update our profile pic but be sure that our profile pic cannot be saved by others but they can take a screenshot of the same. This feature will allow you to decide the people or friends who can view your profile picture on WhatsApp. This will help you to control the misuse or stalking of your Whatsapp account. In order to activate it, go to settings, select accounts, Go to the Privacy tab, Select Profile photo, choose from the 3 option (Everyone, My Contacts, and Nobody).

iv) Manage Group settings: Those who are being stalked may have noticed that they are being added to various groups without their consent or knowledge. You only realize when you start getting unwanted messages from the group. By activating this, you can easily control who can add you to a group. For this, go to setting, choose accounts, select piracy, see Groups option and choose from the three options, Everyone, My Contacts, and My Contacts Except some. In this way, admin of a group who can't add you will send you an invitation to join the group.

v) Block contacts: Many a time, a person stalking you will keep on sending messages on WhatsApp as to know your whereabouts. Some stop when they see that you are not responding but some keep on sending and it actually bothering. The best way to stop such annoying is by blocking that person. To block contacts, Go to Settings, select Account, click on Privacy, Choose block contact, and add that person to the list. When the person is not from your contact list, Open their chat, Click the 3 dots on the right-hand corner or more option, select the Block option.

If someone is sending you unsolicited messages and informations and is seen online when you are active in WhatsApp then the doubt comes in mind as if that person is stalking you or wants to see your activities or has some other mean intention behind that synchronisation action. In such cases the best bet is block that number immediately and if feasible lodge a complaint in cyber police cell. It may also happen that the person might be contacting various people for some information to offend them later online and it may appear to us as if he is stalking to me in particular and in that case the cyber police would find the truth.