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Meredith Whittaker, president of the Signal Foundation. Benoit Tessier/Reuters The president of Signal defended the messaging app’s security on Wednesday after top US Trump administration officials mistakenly included a journalist in an encrypted chatroom they used to discuss looming US military action against Yemen’s Houthis. Signal’s Meredith Whittaker did not directly address the blunder, which Democratic lawmakers have said was a breach of US national security. But she described the app as the “gold standard in private comms” in a post on X, which outlined Signal’s security advantages over Meta’s WhatsApp messaging app. “We’re open source, non-profit, and we develop and apply [end-to-end encryption] and privacy-preserving tech across our system to protect metadata and message contents,” she said. WhatsApp collects metadata that can be used to see who messages whom, and how often Signal has been growing in popularity in Europe, the US and elsewhere as an alternative to WhatsApp because it collects very little data about its users. According to data from Sensor Tower, a market intelligence firm, US downloads of Signal in the first three months of 2025 were up 16% compared to the prior quarter, and 25% compared to the same period in 2024. In a February interview with De Telegraaf, a Dutch newspaper, Whittaker said Signal was a safer alternative because WhatsApp collects metadata that can be used to see who messages whom, and how often. No logs “When compelled, like all companies that collect the data to begin with, they turn this important, revealing data over,” Whittaker said in her post on X. In a statement, a WhatsApp spokesman said it relies on metadata to prevent spam and “keep the service safe from abuse”. Read: Signal messaging app about to get even more secure “We do not keep logs of who everyone is messaging or calling and do not track the personal messages people are sending one another for ads,” the statement said. — James Pearson, with Katie Paul, (c) 2025 Reuters Get breaking news from TechCentral on WhatsApp. Sign up here . Don’t miss: Meta to face antitrust trial over WhatsApp, Instagram acquisitions
