Meta is working on chat summaries and more privacy protection for WhatsApp

We've all been there: you haven't looked at the group chat with your family or friends for a while and you've already got a three-digit number of new messages. Meta wants to help users stay in the picture in such cases without much reading effort – using artificial intelligence (AI). This should first send the unread messages to an AI server, where a summary is then created and sent back. Meta promises special privacy protection. However, there is also an option to deactivate the function for all chat participants.

Similar to how the new Meta AI function recently appeared for many users in WhatsApp, the chat summaries should also work once they have been fully developed. The portal wabetainfo has published screenshots showing a button for the new function above the new messages. This is not yet included in the WhatsApp beta; according to wabetainfo, the function is still under development.

Summary takes place on meta servers

If you tap on the summary button, you can display a short text with all the information from the new messages. To do this, however, the new messages are first sent to the Meta servers, where they are summarized and then sent back. Meta wants to ensure privacy protection with its new "Private Processing" option.

The Group introduced this last week. The aim is to ensure that user data exchanged with Meta AI cannot be intercepted or read at any time. On the one hand, the function is intended to ensure anonymized transmission of user data to the Meta AI services, while still ensuring that the information really comes from a real WhatsApp client. In addition, the information should be protected from any access by third parties during processing on the Meta servers – be it WhatsApp or Meta employees, cyber criminals or "malicious users", as Meta calls them.

Protection through "private processing"

To make this possible, the system first checks whether the requests originate from legitimate WhatsApp user clients, according to wabetainfo. The function is designed to protect their identities through secure private routing and establish encrypted connections to a secure environment that is protected from third-party access. Once the connection is established, the user's device sends requests, such as message summaries, which the AI processes without retaining the original data. Finally, the result is securely sent back to the user's device. "Private processing" can therefore be switched on and off as desired in the WhatsApp settings.

However, if you don't want anyone – including yourself – to be able to summarize the messages in an individual or group chat using AI, you can use the "Advanced Chat Privacy" function. Sensitive conversations and information should remain between the conversation participants and cannot be shared. The AI summaries of chat messages cannot be used here either.

Apple pursues a similar approach called "Private Cloud Compute" (PCC) with its AI functions as part of Apple Intelligence. The big difference is that Apple Intelligence processes as many requests as possible directly on the device and does not transmit them to external servers. If it does become necessary, Apple relies on PCC. However, by default, without users having to specify this in the settings first.

(nen)