Â
Privacy and security for business messages
Business Messaging
Every WhatsApp message is protected by the same Signal encryption protocol that secures messages before they leave your device. When you message a WhatsApp business account, your message is delivered securely to the destination chosen by the business.
WhatsApp considers chats with businesses that use the WhatsApp Business app or manage and store customer messages themselves to be end-to-end encrypted by default. Once the message is received, it will be subject to the business’s own privacy practices. The business may designate employees or other vendors to process and respond to messages, and it may also use the chats it receives for its own marketing purposes, including advertising on Meta.
However, some businesses can choose optional services to interact with customers.
- For example, some can choose WhatsApp’s parent company, Meta to securely store messages and respond to customers. Meta will not automatically use the messages you send a business to inform the ads you see.
- In addition, some can choose to have AI from Meta to assist them in responding to messages sent from customers. Meta will receive these chats to improve its AI quality and generate message responses.
- Some can also choose to use multiple business messaging tools to chat with their customers.
When businesses use these optional services, we display this clearly in the chat and do not consider messages with these businesses to be end-to-end encrypted. The encryption status of an end-to-end encrypted chat can’t change without being visible to the user. For more information about which chats are end-to-end encrypted, please read our Encryption Overview.
Note:
- There are optional services that a business or you can choose to use where Meta receives limited information. For example, you can choose to start a chat with a business after interacting with their ad on Facebook and Instagram or interact with offers and announcements a business may send you on WhatsApp. You’ll see an icon in the chat or on the business profile for these services, which you’ll be able to tap to learn more about how this works.
You’re in control
WhatsApp wants to make sure you know what’s happening with your messages. If you don’t want to receive messages from a person or business, you can always:
- Block them directly from the chat
- Delete them from your contact list