What does a single blue tick on WhatsApp mean? Is it a bug or a new feature?

After being in the news for the phone number leaks in SERP on its click-to-chat links, WhatsApp seems to be throwing a new bug (hope it's not a feature. Fingers crossed) in its latest update 2.20.172. 

This is a stable update, not even beta to host any bugs and I guess it is not tested well of skipped under the nose into a stable release. 

What is happening? What do you mean by a single blue tick?

We know the drill. A single grey tick means that the message has been delivered. Double grey ticks mean the message has been received by the recipient. And those grey ticks turning into blue represents that the recipient has read the message. 

There is another representation of the order of tricks that appear. A single grey tick means that the user is not online. Double grey ticks mean that the recipient is online and has not seen your messages yet. And blue ticks mean that the user has opened the chat but might not have time or interest to reply to the messages.

Another interpretation of the single grey tick is that you could have been blocked if it is not turning to double ticks ever.

Recently, there has been a bug overlaying on the WhatsApp messenger with a single blue tick which freaks out the people with the following assumptions: 

1. Double blue ticks mean that the recipient has seen the message. Is a single blue tick representing seen status from notification preview?
2. Is this another bug leaking messages n between the parties involved in the conversation? Or
3. Is it skipping the double grey ticks feature which is the refinement of 'read recipients' option? 

What if it is 'seen' status from notification preview?

That's not definitely cool. This invades the privacy of the recipients. Nobody wants to be controlled to that level. Everyone is free to make a choice of replying instantly or not. If this is such a feature, this might denote the fall of WhatsApp. While other rivalries, Telegram and up growing Signal are introducing more coolest features and improving their platforms time-to-time, this kind of feature on WhatsApp suffocates users.

What if it is a bug?

A bug, as you know, is a flawed part of the program that is not identified in the testing phase. If it is a bug, it will be rectified soon in the next update hopefully if we could take this error to WhatsApp development teams. 

What if it is a feature refinement? 

We know that there is a lifebuoy feature in WhatsApp that disables 'read recipients' if we wish not to reveal our 'seen' status. This feature needs a sacrifice of seeing others's status as well. To hide your status, you must blindfold against others status. That's the rule of it.

This option has raised new concerns i.e., the users felt ignored after seeing double grey ticks for longer times. This single tick could end this. 

Old chronology: 

Message sent > message received > message seen

Message sent > message received > read recipients turned off

New chronology: 

Message sent > message seen

Message sent > read recipients turned off

If this is a new feature, it eliminates the notification of 'message received' in the breadcrumbs. 

What do you think? Is this a bug or a new feature? Or a refinement to an existing feature.