WhatsApp takes user’s security and privacy very seriously. Having said that, the Facebook-owned messaging app also “works closely with the government and police whenever necessary.” WhatsApp had recently shared a set of guidelines for law enforcement officials seeking records from it. WhatsApp spokesperson Carl Woog in his visit to India has further clarified the company’s take on dealing with government requests for information of a particular user.
“We are a part of Facebook now and contribute to Facebook’s transparency report. In general, we work closely with governments whenever necessary, if there is a critical incident or when they (the government) reach out to us. But because of End-to-End (E2E) encryption enabled by default on WhatsApp, the contents of the messages are not visible to anybody except for the sender and recipient,” said Woog.
“I think what we have tried to talk to governments as to how we can respond to their requests. As we are a part of Facebook, the government requests do come in and we respond, added Woog. He stresses on the fact that unlike other messaging applications out there, if the government requests for content, “we just let them know that we can’t provide it because the chats are E2E encrypted.”