According to Antigone Davis, the head of global safety for ‘Meta,’ formerly Facebook, end-to-end encryption for Facebook Messenger and Instagram messages has been delayed until at least 2023 (via MacRumors).
Previously, the company had promised that end-to-end encryption would be enabled by 2022, but now, Meta says it needs more time to coordinate with “experts in the field of combating online abuse while also protecting user privacy.”
“We believe people shouldn’t have to choose between privacy and safety,” Davis said while adding that Meta is “engaging with privacy and safety experts, civil society and governments to make sure we get this right.”
We’re taking our time to get this right and we don’t plan to finish the global rollout of end-to-end encryption by default across all our messaging services until sometime in 2023. As a company that connects billions of people around the world and has built industry-leading technology, we’re determined to protect people’s private communications and keep people safe online.
Meta already utilizes end-to-end encryption on WhatsApp, including chat backups on iCloud and Google Drive. Earlier this year, Instagram had also said it would be testing “opt-in” end-to-end encryption chats for a limited number of adult users in certain countries.
