A measure to meet European standards
It is in fact the European ePrivacy directive of 2002, on the protection, confidentiality and security of online data, which now applies to messaging services in the 27 Member States of the European Union as well as other associated countries.
In order to comply with the law, we needed to adjust how our services worked, for example by further separating messaging data from other parts of our infrastructure.We now know that the deactivated functions correspond in particular to personalized automatic responses or to surveys on Instagram and Facebook Messenger. These require the use of the content of the message to function and Facebook must comply with the rules of confidentiality on this subject.
The Californian firm indicates, however, that the ePrivacy directive prohibits messaging services from using data "to prevent, detect and respond to child abuse and other forms of harm", for lack of a legal basis for these tools. An identification of content that Facebook must pause while waiting to be in compliance with the EU, recalling its Project Protect initiative for the safety of children online and hoping to be able to have it validated.
Developers also affected
This temporary suspension of services also has an impact for certain developers working with Facebook and the Messenger API, but also foreign companies operating in Europe through Facebook, in particular for chat pages.
According to MessengerPeople.com, Messenger also no longer allows for audio, video or document integration, or photo galleries and buttons on the Desktop version. Facebook says it is working to quickly restore these functions.
The best instant messaging apps to chat with your friends (even abroad)
Instant messaging service apps are racing on Android and iOS. Discover our selection to choose the chat application that suits you best, whether you want to chat discreetly, to ...
Read more
To follow us, we invite you to download our Android and iOS application. You will be able to read our articles, files, and watch our latest YouTube videos.
