the merger between Messenger and WhatsApp imminent?

The firm founded by Mark Zuckerberg has already announced it: it is working on the merger of its different couriers. The beginnings of his work seem to be revealed in the latest version of Messenger, which includes some allusions to the interoperability between Facebook messaging and WhatsApp.

Credits: Gilles Lambert via Unsplash

We’ve been talking about a merger of the different couriers of Facebook – Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram DM – but the firm has not deigned to give news of its cross messaging … until now. As spotted WaBetaInfo, the latest version of the Messenger app gives some clues to this future feature. Some lines of code would indeed assume the imminent deployment of a Messenger crossover with WhatsApp. For now, there is no question of Instagram DMs.

If the idea of grouping these different messaging into one makes sense, Facebook will have a lot to do in order to respect the specifics of each. Messenger only offers encryption on secret conversations. WhatsApp has the ability to encrypt conversations end-to-end, and that’s part of the reason that made it successful. Would this always be the case in the context of cross messaging where one of the users uses WhatsApp and the other Messenger? As for Messenger-specific features, will they also be integrated into WhatsApp?

As indicated WeBetaInfo, some timid steps would have been operated in the direction of this interoperability: “Facebook can understand if a WhatsApp contact is blocked, the sounds of push notifications, the details of a conversation – including information such as the contact’s phone number, message counter, if the conversation is archived, etc. – but not its content, members of a specific group, or contact’s profile pictures. “ The few lines of code found in Messenger, however, do not allude to this famous cross-platform messaging teased by Facebook, even if we can certainly see the beginnings of a coming convergence.