The move is seen as a key step in Facebook’s plan to generate revenue from WhatsApp, but it concerned advocates who worried that the move invaded user privacy. Those businesses could then use that information to create Facebook ads, according to the company. Although WhatsApp had previously said that it wouldn’t store user messages on its servers, the service for businesses would store WhatsApp messages on Facebook’s servers. In the coming months, the company is planning to offer businesses a way of managing WhatsApp conversations with their customers. WhatsApp presents itself as a defender of online privacy in the global encryption debate, but the company experienced some backlash earlier this year when it made changes to its privacy policy reflecting the company’s future plans to offer services for business customers. WhatsApp’s new encryption system could complicate some of those searches, but the fact that it is not enabled by default will greatly reduce the number of people using it, Ms. Justice Department over the strong encryption system that ships with its iPhone, backups of mobile phone data on the iCloud and Google Drive have emerged as important sources of information during investigations.
Illustration: Laura Kammermann/The Wall Street Journal
In an exclusive interview, Apple software chief Craig Federighi sat down with WSJ’s Joanna Stern to defend the technology and explain how it will work. Apple’s tools for flagging child pornography and identifying explicit photos in kids’ messages caused backlash and confusion.