WhatsApp Privacy Promises Face a Legal Test

A group of international plaintiffs has filed a lawsuit against Meta Platforms, Inc., claiming the company has misled users about the privacy of WhatsApp messages.

The case, filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, challenges Meta’s long-standing claim that WhatsApp uses end-to-end encryption that prevents the company itself from accessing user communications.

According to the lawsuit, Meta and WhatsApp allegedly store, analyze, and can access the substance of users’ messages, despite in-app statements telling users that “only people in this chat can read, listen to, or share” their messages.

The plaintiffs argue that these assurances are false and amount to fraud against WhatsApp’s billions of users worldwide.

The lawsuit includes plaintiffs from several countries, including Australia, Brazil, India, Mexico, and South Africa, and cites unnamed whistleblowers as sources for its claims.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs are seeking to have the case certified as a class-action lawsuit, which would significantly expand its scope.

Meta strongly denies the allegations. A company spokesperson described the lawsuit as “frivolous” and said WhatsApp has been protected by end-to-end encryption using the Signal protocol for a decade. Meta says any claim that it can read WhatsApp messages is categorically false.