Facebook Users Will Soon Be Able to Have Secret Chats

Facebook's about to roll out a new tool to protect our privacy when it comes to the convos we're having. 

The ‘secret conversations’ feature will mean nobody but the recipient of a message will be able to access it – not even Facebook, reports Wired.

Whatsapp - who are owned by Facebook - rolled out the tool in April, but is only testing the service with a small percentage of messenger users at present.

Messenger product manager Tony Leach said:

"It’s table stakes in the industry now for messaging apps to offer this to people.

We wanted to make sure we’re doing what we can to make messaging private and secure"

Secret conversations uses a protocol created by non-profit Open Whisper Systems, and works using a ‘lock’ to which only members of a conversation or group chat will have the distinct ‘key’ to access.

The service will be opt-in. 

Matt Green, a computer scientist who reviewed Facebook’s encryption as a consultant, said:

"This is not sucking up to governments. Just doing this will tick them off as much as doing this by default."