2023-08-23 19:47:43
Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, has announced that it plans to expand its default end-to-end encryption in Messenger by the end of the year. This basically means that messages sent on Messenger will be encrypted, just like in WhatsApp, so that only the sender and recipient can read them.
“Starting today, the chats of millions more people on Messenger will be upgraded to higher encryption standards as part of our ongoing end-to-end encryption (E2EE) testing. We’re well on our way. to launch end-to-end encryption by default for conversations between friends and family members on Messenger by the end of the year,” the company announced in a blog post on Tuesday.
Meta has been testing end-to-end encryption in Messenger and Instagram DMs for several years and has already rolled out the feature for select users in specific countries. The company believes the feature is ready for wider rollout and will help protect user privacy.
End-to-end encryption is a secure method of communication in which only the sender and receiver of a message can read it. This means that even Meta cannot see the content of messages sent by Messenger.
“We know that people want a space to connect and they want to know that those conversations are private, safe, and secure. That’s why we’ve spent time building a team of engineers, cryptologists, designers, and talented policy experts who are all committed to deploying end-to-end encryption by default on Messenger,” said Melissa Miranda, product manager at Meta. Messenger users will need to update their app to the latest version in order to access end-to-end encryption by default.
Besides rolling out end-to-end encryption by default, Meta has also added new Messenger features. These features include chat themes, custom emojis and reactions, group profile pictures, link previews, active status, and Bubble on Android. These new features should make Messenger more fun and engaging, while protecting users’ privacy.
Here’s an excerpt from Meta’s announcement:
Starting today, the chats of millions more people on Messenger will be upgraded to stronger encryption standards as part of our ongoing end-to-end encryption (E2EE) testing. We’re still on track to launch end-to-end encryption by default for conversations between friends and family members on Messenger by the end of the year. As we scale up testing, we wanted to provide an update on how we approached this large and complex technical challenge.
Lessons learned from Messenger and WhatsApp
Additionally, we are learning from WhatsApp’s engineering team on how to deliver large-scale and high-speed messages in an E2EE environment. We learned that the system needed to be scalable and reliable, and to be as simple and light as possible. We think about it the same way aircraft designers think about aerodynamics. Streamlining the complexity of our messaging service delivers better results, especially for people with poor connectivity.
Functionality rebuild
During the development of E2EE, we had to rebuild over 100 features in this client-centric way. Messenger is one of the richest chat experiences out there. We know people want encryption, but they also want the same fun and expressiveness they’re used to having on Messenger.
An example of how we’ve rebuilt Messenger is when people share external links like Youtube videos. We know people want to see rich previews, so they can get an idea of what links their friends are sharing before clicking on them. In the old model, the server would fetch this information from Youtube and display an image of the video as a preview. This is why loading the video sometimes took a small second. In contrast, in an E2EE chat, your phone app will go to Youtube. It will get the rich preview for you, and when you click “send”, your app will encrypt the whole thing and send it to the recipient.
Maintain conversations
We also had to build E2EE while maintaining Messenger conversations. We had to rebuild every feature and experience, from sending a message to the most expressive features like stickers. This was all done to make sure Messenger works the way people expect it to, but now with the added privacy and security provided by E2EE. As we continue to scale our testing and prepare to roll out the updated service, users will need to update their application to a recent version to access E2EE by default. This is why the transition of all messages to E2EE will take longer than expected. However, when users update their app to the latest version of Messenger, we will be able to update those conversations with the added privacy and security of E2EE.
Source : Meta
And you ?
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