LAST SPRING WHATSAPP pushed out code adding a new layer of security to a billion users’ apps, creating the largest end-to-end encrypted messaging network in history. Now WhatsApp’s parent company Facebook has finally given people who use its other massively popular chat app the chance to catch up.
A Facebook spokesperson tells WIRED the company just finished rolling out “Secret Conversations” to all 900 million Facebook Messenger users in the past few weeks. The opt-in feature allows users to encrypt their messages so that no one can read them except the two people on either end of a conversation—not even Facebook or law enforcement or intelligence agencies. “Your messages are already secure, but Secret Conversations are encrypted from one device to another,” states a description in the app when users initiate their first encrypted conversation.
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