According to Bloomberg, a team of international plaintiffs had filed a lawsuit against Meta for making false statements about the privacy and security of whatsapp chatting content. The lawsuit was brought before the United States Federal District Court in San Francisco, California, last Friday, and it refers directly to Meta’s stated core commitment to “whatsApp news using end-to-end encryption techniques, and the company’s inability to access user content.”
WhatsApp uses end-to-end encryption as its core function for a long time, with the default opening of the functionality and a clear hint in the chat interface to the user: “This conversation only allows participants to read, listen or share messages”. Meta has repeatedly stressed that this encryption technique ensures that the information is accessible only to the sender and the recipient and that the company cannot access the content itself. In a suit brought before the United States District Court in San Francisco on 23 January, the plaintiff group accused Meta of false statements of privacy. The plaintiff argued that Meta and Whatsapp “store, analyse and have access to the so-called “private” communications of almost all of the Whitsapp users” and accused the company and its head of fraud against billions of people around the world.
The spokesman for Meta described the action as “unfounded” and said that he would “seek sanctions against the plaintiff’s counsel”. According to Bloomberg, Meta’s spokesman, Andy Stone, stated in his email that “any claim that WhatsApp is unencrypted is extremely absurd and totally incorrect. WhatsApp has been doing end-to-end encryption for more than 10 years by using a signatureal agreement, and this action is a totally unfounded fiction.” A group of plaintiffs from Australia, Brazil, India, Mexico and South Africa accused Meta of storing user communications and of being able to access them. The reference in the indictment to “intelligents (informers)” helped to expose the situation, but did not specify their specific identity. Counsel for the plaintiff was requesting the court to certify the case as a class action. If the allegations are established, they could attract millions of users of the Whatsapp worldwide and expose Meta to financial compensation.
