According to Axios websiteThe U.S. House Administrative Office (CAO) has issued a notice to all congressional staff, explicitly prohibiting the use of WhatsApp on mobile devices and computers used by government agencies. Mobile versions, desktop versions and web versions are all included in the banned scope.
The U.S. House of Representatives' Office of Administration stated that WhatsApp's lack of transparency regarding its data protection mechanisms, the unencrypted storage of user data, and potential security vulnerabilities have led to it being considered a high-risk app. Furthermore, the office has reminded congressional staff to remain vigilant against the potential threat of phishing scams.
However, apps such as Microsoft Teams, Signal, Wickr, iMessage and FaceTime are listed as acceptable communication tools because most of these apps are developed by American companies and have a certain degree of government trust and security review process.
Meta then quickly responded, expressing strong disagreement with the assessment of the U.S. House Executive Office, and explained that WhatsApp has already fully implemented end-to-end encryption technology. Not only is Meta unable to access the message during transmission, but the server does not even retain plaintext information. It emphasized that such security standards are even better than most communication apps listed as acceptable.
At the same time, Meta also pointed out that many members of Congress and their staff still rely extensively on WhatsApp for daily communication, and hopes that the US House of Representatives can maintain a consistent view with the Senate and reconsider the WhatsApp usage policy.
In addition to WhatsApp, the U.S. House of Representatives has been taking regulatory measures against a number of potentially risky apps since last year, including banning artificial intelligence or video tools such as TikTok, ChatGPT, DeepSeek, and Microsoft Copilot, reflecting the U.S. government's high attention to information security and data sovereignty.
