The US House of Representatives has reportedly banned WhatsApp from all government-issued devices. As per reports, the reasons cited are concerns over data protection and cybersecurity. The decision was reportedly announced on Monday in a memo sent to all House staff, as first reported by Axios, and confirmed by Reuters. The Office of Cybersecurity, which operates under the House’s Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), said in the memo that WhatsApp poses a “high risk to users due to the lack of transparency in how it protects user data, the absence of stored data encryption, and potential security risks involved with its use”, according to Reuters.
Staffers have reportedly been instructed to remove the app from all House-managed devices, including mobile phones, desktop computers, and web browsers. “If you have a WhatsApp application on your House-managed device, you will be contacted to remove it,” the CAO said in the email.
In its place, the office has recommended more secure messaging platforms such as Signal, Microsoft Teams, Wickr, Apple’s iMessage and FaceTime. Staff were reportedly also told to stay alert for phishing attempts and suspicious messages from unknown numbers.
WhatsApp’s parent company, Meta Platforms, strongly disagreed with the move. In a statement to Axios, company spokesperson Andy Stone said, “We disagree with the House Chief Administrative Officer’s characterisation in the strongest possible terms.”
Stone defended the app’s encryption features, adding, “Messages on WhatsApp are end-to-end encrypted by default, meaning only the recipients – and not even WhatsApp – can see them. This is a higher level of security than most of the apps on the CAO’s approved list that do not offer that protection.”
Meta also expressed hope that members of the House would eventually be allowed to use WhatsApp in line with their Senate colleagues.
In January this year, a WhatsApp official revealed that Israeli spyware company Paragon Solutions had targeted a number of users on the platform, including journalists and members of civil society – further adding to concerns about the app’s vulnerability to spyware attacks.
Earlier this month, amid its ongoing conflict with Israel, Iran also urged its citizens to delete WhatsApp from their phones because many officials in the country shared suspicion that some sensitive data like location was being leaked via mobile apps, including WhatsApp. The platform is widely used in Iran for both personal and professional communication, making the warning particularly significant.
While the state broadcast in Iran did not offer any direct evidence to support the claim, it quoted unnamed officials warning that the app might be “gathering user information” and transmitting it to the Israeli military. This accusation was firmly denied by Meta.
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