Meta Adds Labels to Business Chats in Messenger

Meta’s looking to clarify how its data collection process works within business chats on Messenger, with the addition of new in-stream labels that’ll differentiate between business and personal interactions in the app.

As you can see in this example, business chats on Messenger will now include a “Business Chat” label in the top title bar, while there’s also a new “Business chats and Your privacy” shortcut link. Which, when tapped, will display the second explainer screen above.

The main intention here is to clarify that while end-to-end encryption is being rolled out to all personal chats on Messenger, business chats see the user sharing information with Meta, and the business itself, which could then be used for future ad targeting and marketing purposes.

In other words, business chats are not private, and are not protected by the same encryption tools by default. As such, Meta’s looking to ensure that users are aware that they’re submitting their info for potentially expanded purpose within these interactions.

As per Meta:

“We’re giving people more information about how their business messages may be used to improve their experience. Depending on where people live, this could include improved product experiences such as faster response, personalized ads, and improved AI quality.”

Meta says that it started rolling out these labels earlier in the year, and it’s now expanding them to more users.

“This is not a change to our privacy policy or terms of service and this doesn’t apply to personal messages with friends and family.”

So essentially, Meta’s looking to ensure that people know that when they interact with a business on Messenger, they won’t have the same privacy as when they’re interacting with friends.

Which is important to note, though even then, it feels like the upfront notification here should be more explicit, and should directly state, in the chat header, that the exchange is not protected by E2EE.

But at least it’s something, and it’s an important step to provide greater transparency and understanding within the process, especially as more Messenger elements are moving to encryption by default.