If you happen to be a Messenger user, you’ll be glad to know that Meta may finally have a fully encrypted chatting service.
Meta announced on Monday that Messenger users may soon be notified their service is being upgraded to facilitate end-to-end encryption for all messages.
Meta’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg first made a short post about it on his Facebook page, also mentioning there will be link previews, custom emojis, and new themes added in the near future.
According to the company’s blog post, E2E will be rolled out over the next few months, with users suddenly finding more of their chats updated with encryption.
Individual chat threads will be notified of the change. Meta stated that this was a “random process” designed to ensure that there were no problems with their own app infrastructure.
The change will essentially make E2E encryption default, notifying the users with a message “Messenger secured this chat with end-to-end encryption.” The app’s chat list will then include a little “lock” icon next to chats that are now E2E encrypted.
Users don’t have any option but to accept the new state of affairs, but the company promised it won’t have any impact on users’ ability to see message histories or report problem messages.
New Features Brought To Meta’s Encrypted Chats
Here are some of the new features Mark Zuckerberg announced would make their way to the new E2E Messenger app.
- Chat themes: Meta have added chat themes to help personalize and enhance your conversations in end-to-end encrypted chats.
- Custom chat emojis and reactions: Want to personalize your response? You will now be able to view the full menu of emoji reactions and customize the quick reaction tray in end-to-end encrypted chats.
- Group profile photos: The ability to choose group profile photos for different chats with friends or work colleagues is now possible.
- Link previews: You will now be able to see where a link is taking you, before clicking on it.
- Active Status: People will now see when you’re active, so they know when it’s a good time to call. You can also choose to turn this feature off, if you want to improve your privacy.
- Bubbles on Android: Bubbles (a circle with your friend’s picture) let you read and reply to messages while you’re using other apps. Once enabled, a bubble will appear when you get a new message.
Meta previously stated that it expects to implement default end-to-end encryption protection across all of its apps by 2023.
The company has not provided a recent update on this timeline, but it has stated that it will provide updates as it works to bring end-to-end encryption to Messenger.
