WhatsApp, the popular messaging app, has rolled out encrypted messages for its entire service. The encryption now protects texts, voice calls video and chat rooms.
The new encryption service covers all of the WhatsApp apps and all of its services. This means that not even WhatsApp employees have access to any data sent across the network. WhatsApp uses a public key encryption. This encrypts the message on your end, then uses a private key to decrypt the message on the receiving end. If you’re curious about exactly how it works, WhatsApp has a technical paper published here (PDF). You won’t have to do anything to turn this feature on, but you can verify it’s working by looking for the lock icon under the contact info in your messages.