Texas sues WhatsApp, Meta over alleged privacy violations
Texas sues WhatsApp, Meta over alleged privacy violations
https://www.texastribune.org/2026/05/21/texas-whatsapp-meta-privacy-encryption-lawsuit/
Publish Date: 2026-05-21 17:28:00
Source Domain: www.texastribune.org
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Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton added WhatsApp to the growing list of companies he has accused of violating Texans’ data privacy, announcing a lawsuit against the messaging app and its parent company, Meta, on Thursday.
The lawsuit states WhatsApp is deceiving its users by claiming to offer “end-to-end encryption,” or a software that conceals the contents of a message to anyone, including the company, except to the sender and receiver. This follows Paxton’s lawsuit against Netflix, also over privacy issues, earlier this month and a recent settlement with smart TV maker LG electronics, all while he pursues the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in a heated runoff against incumbent John Cornyn.
“Texans deserve to know whether their private communications are indeed truly private,” Paxton wrote in a statement. “WhatsApp markets its services as secure and encrypted, but it does not deliver on those promises. I am suing to protect Texans’ privacy and ensure that WhatsApp by Meta does not mislead Texans by unlawfully accessing private conversations and data.”
For years, Meta has faced allegations and lawsuits that it can, in fact, view private messages sent on WhatsApp. The company, which acquired WhatsApp in 2014, has consistently denied the claims.
“WhatsApp cannot access people’s encrypted communications and any suggestion to the contrary is false,” Meta spokesperson Rachel Holland wrote in a statement responding to Paxton’s lawsuit Thursday. “We will fight this suit as we continue defending our strong record on protecting people’s messages.”
The lawsuit and a news release from Paxton’s office point to whistleblowers that claim Meta does have access to messages sent on the platform.
A federal Commerce Department investigation into Meta and WhatsApp was abruptly closed…
