Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook, has prohibited the use of WhatsApp in the U.S. House of Representatives.
According to Reuters on the 23rd (local time), the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) of the House of Representatives has notified congressional staff of the ban on using WhatsApp on government-issued devices. Along with Facebook and Instagram, WhatsApp is a major social media platform of Meta, with 3 billion monthly active users.
In an email sent to staff, the CAO stated, "House staff are not permitted to download or have the WhatsApp app on any House device, including mobile, desktop, and web browser versions," adding, "If WhatsApp is installed on a House device, you will be contacted to delete it."
The CAO explained that the reason for the WhatsApp ban is that "the Cybersecurity Office assessed WhatsApp as high risk due to its lack of transparency in protecting user data, absence of storage data encryption, and potential security concerns associated with its use." As a result, it recommended using other messaging apps such as Microsoft Teams, Amazon's Wickr, or Apple's iMessage.
In response, Andy Stone, a spokesperson for Meta, said, "We strongly oppose the assessment by the House CAO," adding, "We know that members and their staff are using WhatsApp, and we expect the House to officially use WhatsApp just like the Senate." He emphasized, "Messages on WhatsApp are fundamentally end-to-end encrypted, meaning that only the recipient can view the content, which is a higher level of security than most of the other apps on the CAO-approved list."
The House CAO has previously imposed partial usage bans on TikTok, DeepSeek, and Microsoft's Copilot over the past few years, and has strictly limited the use of ChatGPT to only the paid version, ChatGPT Plus, according to the internet media Axios.