

Matthew Green, a cryptographer at John Hopkins University, raised concerns on Twitter about the data that could be shared between the apps and whether WhatsApp's encryption would become less secure. It's unclear what user information will be shared among Facebook Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp. Last year, revelations surfaced that UK political consultancy Cambridge Analytica harvested the data of up to 87 million Facebook users without their permission. Integrating the apps could help Facebook make more money from ads by getting its users to spend more time texting in its chat apps rather than turning to other texting services by Apple and Google, according to people who spoke to the Times.īut the changes might not sit well with some Facebook users, who have become more wary about the data the company shares with other tech firms following a number of scandals. That list of departures includes Instagram co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, WhatApp's Brian Acton and Jan Koum and Oculus co-founders Palmer Luckey and Brendan Iribe. Some of these founders reportedly have butted heads with Zuckerberg and left the company. Facebook purchased WhatsApp for $19 billion in 2014 and Instagram for $1 billion in 2012.

The strategy also highlights how Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is exerting more control over the companies Facebook acquired for billions of dollars.

"We're working on making more of our messaging products end-to-end encrypted and considering ways to make it easier to reach friends and family across networks." "We want to build the best messaging experiences we can and people want messaging to be fast, simple, reliable and private," a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement. The tech firm, which has faced a series of scandals over data misuse and privacy, plans to finish this work by the end of this year or early 2020, according to The New York Times, citing four people working on the project. The changes would allow you to send messages from one of the company's chat systems to another - so you could speak to your Messenger-only friends without leaving WhatsApp.įacebook said it's still figuring out the details, but the apps would include end-to-end encryption, ensuring that only the participants of a conversation can view the messages being sent. The three standalone apps will remain separate, but they'll be brought together under a single messaging platform or protocol. Facebook plans to make it possible for WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram users to send messages to one another without switching apps.
