Meta’s widespread messaging app, WhatsApp, has been banned from the U.S. Home of Representatives, the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) Catherine Szpindor informed employees there on Monday.
“The Workplace of Cybersecurity has deemed WhatsApp a high-risk to customers as a result of lack of transparency in the way it protects person knowledge, absence of saved knowledge encryption, and potential safety dangers concerned with its use,” the e mail stated, seen by Axios.
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The be aware stated the app is banned from all authorities units, together with telephones and computer systems.
“Home employees are NOT allowed to obtain or maintain the WhatsApp utility on any Home gadget, together with any cellular, desktop, or internet browser variations of its merchandise,” the e-mail added. “When you’ve got a WhatsApp utility in your Home-managed gadget, you may be contacted to take away it.”
In the meantime, Meta spokesperson Andy Stone responded on X that the tech big disagrees “within the strongest doable phrases.”
“We all know members and their staffs repeatedly use WhatsApp and we stay up for making certain members of the Home can be a part of their Senate counterparts in doing so formally,” Stone wrote.
Messages on WhatsApp are end-to-end encrypted by default, that means solely the recipients and never even WhatsApp can see them. It is a larger degree of safety than many of the apps on the CAO’s accepted checklist that don’t supply that safety.
— Andy Stone (@andymstone) June 23, 2025
“Messages on WhatsApp are end-to-end encrypted by default, that means solely the recipients and never even WhatsApp can see them,” Stone added. “It is a larger degree of safety than many of the apps on the CAO’s accepted checklist that don’t supply that safety.”
Szpindor informed CNBC in a written assertion that “defending the Folks’s Home is our topmost precedence,” and this was enacted after “monitoring and analyzing for potential cybersecurity dangers that might endanger the info of Home Members and employees.”
It is not the primary tech ban that the CAO has enacted, both. ChatGPT is restricted, and there have been full and partial bans on a number of instruments and apps, together with DeepSeek, TikTok, and Microsoft Copilot.
Meta’s widespread messaging app, WhatsApp, has been banned from the U.S. Home of Representatives, the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) Catherine Szpindor informed employees there on Monday.
“The Workplace of Cybersecurity has deemed WhatsApp a high-risk to customers as a result of lack of transparency in the way it protects person knowledge, absence of saved knowledge encryption, and potential safety dangers concerned with its use,” the e mail stated, seen by Axios.
Associated: Microsoft Workers Are Banned From Utilizing This Well-liked AI App
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