Make DMs Safe
Big Tech
In the first weeks of August, news broke about a Nebraska teen and mother facing felony charges for violating state anti-abortion laws after investigators successfully obtained their private messages directly from Facebook.
While direct messages on platforms like Facebook Messenger and Twitter might seem private, they aren’t. Most Big Tech companies are constantly collecting and storing your information, including your messages, and if presented with a warrant from law enforcement, chances are they will comply and hand over the data they’ve collected.
That’s why we need to demand that all companies with messaging platforms immediately protect your direct messages with end-to-end encryption (E2EE). When messages are end-to-end encrypted, only the people sending and receiving them have access to them. Messages that aren’t end-to-end encrypted can be accessed by the platform itself, and could even be intercepted by third parties, like malicious hackers. If Facebook Messenger had been secured by default E2EE, it would’ve been impossible for Meta to hand over the Nebraska teen’s DMs to law enforcement; the company can’t pass on messages it was never able to read in the first place.
End-to-end encryption isn't a new thing. Digital rights activists and journalists, as well as sex workers, racial justice activists, and other groups that are systematically targeted by surveillance and police abuse have been demanding end-to-end encrypted messaging for years. Some platforms have responded: E2EE is already the default for WhatsApp, iMessage, and Signal. Now more than ever, as our right to abortion and other fundamental freedoms are under attack, we need ALL platforms to take action to ensure we have safe spaces to communicate with friends and loved ones online.
End-to-end encryption doesn’t only protect privacy—it saves people’s lives. It’s time to implement it as the default for every messaging platform across all devices.
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We are groups and individuals representing a diversity of organizations and communities who depend on digital tools to meet our missions and deliver our critical services. We are activists organizing for change; journalists who communicate with sources and about sensitive stories; nonprofits providing care and support for our communities; companies that need to streamline our processes and share ideas; students, creators, gamers, alumni, artists, athletes, and other communities that use the Internet to connect with people all over the world.
Safety should be a built-in feature of all technology, so we are calling on all messaging platforms to protect users by making end-to-end encryption the default for messages to protect our privacy.
In the US and around the world, governments are using data and digital communications to target human rights defenders and people exposing human rights violations, including nonprofits, activist networks, and journalists. For many of these groups and individuals, the ability to message people online is absolutely vital, but it could also become the basis of government targeting, repression, and censorship.
Law enforcement has a long history of monitoring marginalized groups—including BIPOC, immigrants, social justice activists, and sex workers. Personal communications immediately became a target for criminalizing abortions in the US after the reversal of Roe v Wade. Security experts and human rights organizations have sounded the alarm about this abuse and point to default end-to-end encrypted messaging as a first and best step companies can take to protect targeted communities.
While some companies have responded to demands to prioritize user security by expanding end-to-end encryption, others have failed to take action, leaving too many people vulnerable. Organizations of all sizes and missions rely on communication tools to coordinate program and service options every day. Mental health service providers coordinate follow-on care for a client, immigration support lawyers update a colleague on a case filing, after school activity center staff identify students needing additional care, and overnight safe shelter teams communicate status updates between shifts. All of these activities and more are critical for effective programs and services that are used every day by some of the most systemically marginalized communities. End-to-end encryption in the communications tools staff use to manage those programs is crucial for protecting people from anti-human rights attacks on their bodily autonomy, personhood, and rights.
Default end-to-end encryption for all direct messaging is the single most important action companies can take right now to protect vulnerable people and proactively create a culture of privacy and security among your user base.