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Spicy debate between Musk and WhatsApp boss
WhatsApp CEO Will Cathcart has dismissed Elon Musk's claims that the popular messaging app "exports your user data every night."
Cathcart replied to Musk right on Xu that his claims have no weight and are simply "not true". He recalled the fact that all messages in WhatsApp are end-to-end encrypted, which means that the company has no possibility of reading private messages of users.
Yann LeCun, the head of artificial intelligence at Meta, also intervened in the conversation and, as expected, defended WhatsApp, since it is, after all, a product of the parent company (Meta). He commented on the event on the Threads platform, which turned the battle into a battle between two similar platforms, and accused Musk of making false claims and spreading conspiracy theories on his platform.
Not a day goes by that Musk doesn't say something controversial or start an argument with well-known players from important industries. Former employees also give him a lot of headaches. By all accounts, the WhatsApp boss is right. Encryption is set so that only the sender and recipient can read the content. They confirmed their commitment to this strong encryption when they risked a UK ban for not wanting to weaken the way they encrypt data.
On the other hand, WhatsApp messages don't only contain words, images and clips. Metadata hides many things, including information that is very useful for advertisers. This has been pointed out by many experts.
"WhatsApp messages are end-to-end encrypted, but user data is more than just messages," security expert Tommy Mysk remarked to Xu. "This also includes metadata such as the user's location, with whom the user communicates, conversation patterns, when the user uses the app most often, and more."
The fact that WhatsApp shares metadata with other platforms owned by Meta is not a secret, they also have this written in their privacy policy. However, this is still a matter of concern for many who worry about what this data is used for. There is enough information hidden in the metadata that companies that get their hands on it can design targeted proposals and ads. That's why metadata is an advertising treasure trove.
The heated debate between Musk and Cathcart is just another reminder of how much data we've volunteered to the biggest companies.
