A privacy war is brewing... Elon Musk questions the reliability of WhatsApp.

 

Elon Musk

A privacy war is brewing... Elon Musk questions the reliability of WhatsApp.

Elon Musk reignited his rivalry with Meta on Thursday after saying he "cannot trust WhatsApp ," the popular messaging app owned by Meta, which is led by Mark Zuckerberg.

The billionaire's remarks came in light of a new class-action lawsuit filed against Meta, alleging that the app intercepted users' private messages despite claiming to provide end-to-end encryption, and even shared them with third parties such as the IT company Accenture.

In response to a post on the X platform about the lawsuit, Musk wrote, "He can't trust WhatsApp." In another post, the billionaire urged users to switch to his X Chat messaging, voice, and video calling app, saying it "comes with this amazing feature of true privacy," according to a report by Live Minit, which was reviewed by Al Arabiya Business.

X Chat is a messaging and calling service belonging to Musk's X platform, and the standalone app for this service is expected to launch on April 17, 2026.
WhatsApp responded strongly to these claims in a comment on Musk's post, saying that "the claims in this lawsuit are completely false and ridiculous. WhatsApp has been end-to-end encrypted using the Signal protocol for a decade, so no one but the sender and recipient can read your messages."

A Bloomberg report earlier this year stated that US law enforcement agencies are investigating claims made by a former Meta contractor that the company was able to access WhatsApp messages despite claims of end-to-end encryption.

The investigation was reportedly led by special agents from the U.S. Department of Commerce. The company was also the subject of a similar whistleblower complaint filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in 2024.

According to reports, two people who worked in content moderation at WhatsApp last year told an investigator at the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security that some employees of Meta were able to access WhatsApp messages.
They said that some employees of the consulting firm Accenture have broad powers to access the content of people's private messages.

One customer wrote: "Both sources confirmed that employees at their workplaces have unrestricted access to WhatsApp."
The Bloomberg report indicates that Larkin Fordyce was a contractor with Accenture, where he worked on content moderation for Meta, and claimed that contractors were subsequently granted their own access privileges on the platform.

However, even before that, he claimed that they were able to request access to communications, and that "the Facebook team was able to extract any content they wanted and send it."

🚨 BREAKING: Elon Musk confirms XChat launch – the “Western WeChat” – hits App Store on April 17. End-to-end encrypted, no ads, no tracking. A strategic move after 4 years in development, poised to challenge WhatsApp & Telegram.…

— Dino breaking news (@DinoLeadingNews) April 12, 2026