WhatsApp announced last month that it was bringing its end-to-end encryption to chat backups. This is following the discovery of the feature in a beta build in July. Now, it looks like the Facebook subsidiary is finally rolling out the feature.
The announcement came via Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg himself. The post itself doesn’t provide a lot of information, but it’s safe to assume that it will gradually be made available to more users as time goes by.
WhatsApp implemented end-to-end encryption all the way back in 2016, but this did not apply to backups. The encryption adds another layer of security to conversations that you’d likely like to keep private. This makes it so that the cloud storage provider, be it Google Drive for Android devices or Apple iCloud for iOS, won’t be able to see what’s inside. You even get two options as to the way you want the encryption to work for the backups.
Once the rollout is complete, WhatsApp would have a completely end-to-end encrypted messaging experience. This does put it above parent company Facebook’s own Messenger app in terms of appeal, especially if you don’t want to have to specifically enable the Secret Conversation option for it.
(Source: Mark Zuckerberg / Facebook)
