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WhatsApp is planning to add a new artificial intelligence (AI) features to its service despite a user backlash against the technology.
The private messaging app said it would explore adding AI-powered writing suggestions and summaries to the service.
The decision is likely to frustrate many of its users amid criticism of the app’s decision to include parent company Meta’s AI chatbot within its service.
WhatsApp now features a button to pull up the Meta AI chatbot, which can answer questions in English in a similar manner to ChatGPT. It also offers AI-powered search suggestions.
The Meta AI button, which takes the form of a glowing blue ring within the app, has left users annoyed and asking for ways to turn it off. Users on Reddit have said they “hate” the tool and branded it “bug-ridden rubbish”.
A WhatsApp spokesman said last week that its AI features were “entirely optional, and people can choose to use them or not”.
The spokesman added: “We think giving people these options is a good thing, and we’re always listening to feedback from our users to make WhatsApp better.”
Cyber security experts also questioned whether WhatsApp’s decision to add more AI tools represented a “compromise” on privacy.
In order to handle AI requests, some data from a user’s message would need to be processed on external servers, rather than the user’s smartphone. Meta said its system would be built in such a way that no third party would be able to see the contents of a message from a user.
Meta said: “No one except you and the people you’re talking to can access or share your personal messages, not even Meta or WhatsApp.”
But Adrianus Warmenhoven, a cyber security adviser at NordVPN, said: “It’s still a compromise. Any time data leaves your device – no matter how securely – it introduces new risks.
“WhatsApp has clearly worked to reduce those risks, but it’s a balancing act between user demand for smart features and the foundational promise of end-to-end encryption.”
WhatsApp said it planned to build the tools in a manner that “allows our users around the world to use AI in a privacy-preserving way”.
WhatsApp’s encryption technology, which means nobody but the sender and recipient of a message can read it, makes it technically challenging to add AI prompts.
The company said it had developed a technology called Private Processing, which would soon allow users to make a “confidential and secure” request to an AI tool that can then re-write their messages or send a summary of recent posts in a group chat.
The new feature was announced at LlamaCon 2025 at the company’s Menlo Park headquarters. Meta, which also owns Facebook and Instagram, also revealed a standalone app for its Meta AI chatbot.