Facebook is testing encryption as a way to make Messenger more secure—and to entice wary non-users to the app.
The social media giant is banking on users’ increasing desire to privatize their conversations so they’re only available on the mobile devices to and from which they are sent.
This capability is already available on Facebook-owned WhatsApp.
The new function—the ominously named “secret conversations”—lets users set a date for the message to expire. At that time, it will no longer be available on either device.
This is all an effort to become “your preferred and primary communication platform,” Messenger chief David Marcus told The New York Times.
He told TechCrunch that the company felt “[it] needed to go one more extra step with this new mode.”
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So, why would a user refuse to opt in to end-to-end encryption? For one, it will prevent users from being able to access their messages on multiple devices. Multimedia content such as GIFs and videos will not play in encrypted messages. You also can’t use the payment feature.
Here’s additional detail from Marcus via TechCrunch:
It’s that extra layer that you’ll want for those special conversations where you send a Social Security number, a username or password, checking account information for a payment, medical data of some kind. For those types of things, you want to have a little bit more peace of mind. We feel like the approach for us, given how people use our product, is really the right one and the security experts out there have been very supportive of the approach we’ve taken.
Facebook says it’ll roll out encrypted conversations by the end of this summer. Users must opt in to use it.
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