After facing massive backlash on its privacy policy, WhatsApp has released a global privacy-focused ad campaign.
WhatsApp’s privacy changes in January implied that the firm would be sharing a user’s specific information to Facebook and extending the end-to-end encryption feature. This led to many users boycotting the app to move to other messaging apps such as Signal and Telegram. UK’s Home Secretary also criticised WhatsApp’s decision to further expand the end-to-end encryption across Facebook and Instagram, claiming that this could be unsafe and harmful to children and lead to rise in criminal activities. The outrage caused Whatsapp to pause the rollout of new privacy policies to modify the changes.
Eshan Ponnadurai, Director of Brand and Consumer Marketing at WhatsApp, asserted WhatsApp’s focus on privacy and encryption:
“[Users] trust WhatsApp with their most private and powerful conversations. This campaign aims to encourage and empower our users to speak freely and confidently with their connections by giving them confidence that all they communicate on WhatsApp is private, safe in the knowledge that we provide the most secure form of encryption possible to protect their privacy every day.”
Their latest ad campaign “Message privately” highlights the importance of end-to-end encryption and how it protects personal information between the two users. The campaign includes four short films created by digital agencies BBDO San Francisco, BBDO Berlin, BBDO India, Mindshare and Creative X.
WhatsApp’s campaign launched in the UK and Germany on June 14 with upcoming premieres across France, Mexico, Brazil, Indonesia, and India in the coming months.