Key Points
When Meta Platforms began rolling out encryption for Facebook direct messages this month, it was advancing a project that members of its safety staff have long warned would end in disaster..
Even before that, some Meta employees such as David Erb had warned internally that such encryption would limit the ability to detect and report child sexual abuse on Metas platforms..
Worried that would prevent Meta from combating the child-safety problems his group had uncovered, Erb told his manager that he would resign if encryption were implemented on Facebook messages, he says..
While other companies, including Apple, have implemented such encryption on their messaging platforms, and Metas own WhatsApp platform is already the worlds largest encrypted messaging app, those services dont generally connect users with strangers..
Metas Stone called it patently absurd" to claim that cost or labor savings factored into the decision to not exempt underage users from encryption. . Guy Rosen, now Metas chief information security officer, told employees in May 2019 that encrypting messages would require taking a different approach to detecting bad actors with the unencrypted data the company could still access..
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