In the span of two weeks, two of the world’s largest social media platforms have signaled they are done treating privacy as an unconditional promise. Together, the moves mark a decisive reckoning with what private messaging on social media actually costs—and who pays the price.
A TikTok spokesperson told Fortune that the company’s approach to messaging has not changed. “Direct messages on TikTok are secured using industry-standard encryption in transit and at rest,” the spokesperson said, comparing the technology to what Gmail uses. “People’s messages are private and protected. Access to message content is strictly limited, subject to internal authorization controls, and only available to trained personnel with a demonstrated need to review the information as part of safety investigations, legal compliance, or other limited circumstances.” In other words: not end-to-end encrypted, but far from an open book.
The distinction matters. The TikTok spokesperson said the design is deliberate—and that the lack of end-to-end encryption is itself a safety feature. “Messaging on TikTok is not end-to-end encrypted,” they said. “This helps make our platform undesirable for those who would attempt to share illegal material.” Meta had not yet responded to requests for comments.
Brian Long, CEO and co-founder of Adaptive Security, a firm that trains organizations to defend against AI-powered attacks, including deepfakes and voice cloning, says the calculus both companies are making reflects a necessary course correction. “It’s a challenging place, because on the one side, I think a lot of these companies have leaned into privacy,” Long told Fortune. “But on the other hand, it’s also led bad actors to do anything from run scams in the background to attack consumers. What they’re recognizing is that as great as it sounds for everything to be encrypted, it’s giving a lot of runway to bad actors.”
For privacy advocates, lifting encryption is still a serious concession, and one that opens user data to platform surveillance alongside the safety benefits. But for scam prevention professionals, it’s the right call. “I think companies are recognizing there are some potential serious downsides to privacy,” Long said. “At the end of the day, this correction is probably needed in order to stop more of the bad actors. And if privacy is the biggest priority, there are applications available that people can go use.”
