Texas AG targets Meta in privacy fight

The Texas Attorney General has sued WhatsApp and Meta, claiming the messaging software misleads customers by promising privacy it cannot achieve.

The lawsuit, filed Thursday in Harrison County state district court, claims WhatsApp deceptively portrays its service as “end-to-end encrypted,” meaning only the sender and receiver can read conversations. Paxton’s office claims the assertion is false and violates the Texas False Trade Practices Act, the state consumer protection legislation.

“Texans deserve to know whether their private communications are truly private,” Paxton added. “WhatsApp markets its services as secure and encrypted, but it does not deliver on those promises.”

Meta denied it. Rachel Holland, a Meta representative, said, “WhatsApp cannot access people’s encrypted communications, and any suggestion to the contrary is false.” She added the firm will fight the complaint.

The lawsuit wants a judge to stop WhatsApp from accessing messages without consent and charge it $10,000 each infraction.

Paxton's office claimed the lawsuit is based on whistleblower accusations Meta can read WhatsApp chats. Bloomberg reports that the lawsuit also cites a federal Commerce Department inquiry into Meta and WhatsApp that was halted earlier this year after an investigator noted in a document that Meta could examine “no limit” of WhatsApp chats.

The case is the latest in a spate of legal measures Paxton has launched against major tech and media corporations. He sued Netflix for data privacy this month. On Thursday, he stated his office would examine Meta over Meta Glasses' audio and video privacy protections.

Paxton has settled with major tech corporations. Meta settled a face recognition lawsuit with Texas for $1.4 billion in 2024. In another data-gathering lawsuit last year, Google paid Texas $1.4 billion.

The new lawsuit comes as Paxton campaigns for the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in a runoff against incumbent John Cornyn.