Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s CEO, confirmed the new characteristic in a Facebook put up. (Image: Facebook/Mark Zuckerberg)
Meta, the dad or mum firm of WhatsApp, has launched Chat Lock as a further safety characteristic, aiming to supply customers with an additional layer of safety for their personal conversations
WhatsApp, the messaging app owned by Meta, unveiled on Monday its new characteristic known as ‘Chat Lock’, designed to reinforce person privateness. This characteristic securely hides conversations in a password-protected folder, making certain that notifications don’t reveal the sender or message content material.
Mark Zuckerberg, founder, chairman and CEO of Meta confirmed the new characteristic in a Facebook put up stating, “They’re hidden in a password protected folder and notifications received’t present sender or message content material.”
The Chat Lock feature will relocate a chat thread from the app’s main inbox and transfer it to a dedicated folder accessible only through a password or biometric authentication, such as facial recognition or fingerprint scanning. The new feature ensures enhanced security and privacy for users’ confidential conversations.
As part of its comprehensive privacy package, Meta enables WhatsApp users to encrypt their backups, restrict screenshot capabilities, and enable automatic message disappearance.
UK’s Online Safety Bill
The new feature comes after US social media giant opposed UK’s proposed the Online Safety Bill claiming it would “weaken the privacy” of customers worldwide. The UK authorities’s proposal for tech corporations to help legislation enforcement businesses in combating little one sexual abuse on their platforms has sparked considerations over privateness and surveillance.
WhatsApp was amongst different messaging companies that had issued an open letter demanding an “pressing rethink” of the legislation last month.
“The UK government is currently considering new legislation that opens the door to trying to force technology companies to break end-to-end encryption on private messaging services,” WhatsApp mentioned in an open letter on its weblog web page dated April 17.
Signed by WhatsApp head Will Cathcart and managers of different messaging companies together with Signal and Wire, the letter acknowledged: “We don’t assume any firm, authorities or particular person ought to have the energy to learn your private messages and we’ll proceed to defend encryption expertise.”
Several industry leaders, including OPTF/Session, Threema, Viber, and Element, have signed a letter opposing the legislation.
The letter argues that the proposed laws could lead to widespread and indiscriminate surveillance of personal messages, affecting various individuals, including friends, family members, journalists, human rights activists, and politicians. It emphasizes that such measures would undermine everyone’s ability to communicate securely and calls for a revision of the legislation to prioritize privacy and security.
The signatories of the letter and industry leaders are urging the UK government to reconsider its approach, emphasizing the importance of preserving encryption, protecting privacy, and avoiding mass surveillance of private communications.
Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak responded to the row stating “will not introduce routine scanning of private communication”.
While the state does “assist sturdy encryption, this can not come at the value of public security”, Sunak’s spokesman had said.
(With inputs from AFP)
