WhatsApp Introduces Meta AI-Powered Message Summaries to Catch Up on Unread Messages

WhatsApp on Wednesday rolled out a new artificial intelligence (AI)-backed feature which can summarise messages for you. Dubbed Message Summaries, it leverages Meta AI to help users catch up on unread texts. As per Meta, the feature uses a new technology called Private Processing, which is claimed to keep the message from being read by anyone else in the chat, including Meta. On WhatsApp, users can also use Advanced Chat Privacy to highlight only select texts which they need to summarise.

Message Summaries on WhatsApp

In a blog post, WhatsApp detailed its new Message Summaries feature. Available in individual and group chats, it is said to be completely optional and is turned off by default. Message Summaries are generated by Meta AI in a bulleted list view when tapping the Unread messages icon in a chat.

The condensed message window carries the text “visible only to you” and is protected by Private Processing, as per the instant messaging client. It allows Meta AI to generate responses without letting the chatbot, or WhatsApp itself, ever read the messages or the AI-powered summaries.

Message Summaries on WhatsApp are initially rolling out to users in the US in the English language. It will be expanded to include more languages and regions later this year, as per the company.

How It Works

Meta, WhatsApp's parent company, explains that Private Processing is a computing infrastructure built on top of the Trusted Execution Environment (TEE). The security measure lets people interact with the AI chatbot in a private cloud environment. It uses a threat model and is designed with three foundational requirements.

The first is confidential processing, which mandates that Private Processing be built in such a way that prevents any other first or third-party system from accessing the user data while in processing or in transit to the computing infrastructure.

Next is enforceable guarantees, which means if a threat actor attempts to modify the confidential processing guarantee, the system will shutdown and prevent further operation, or the modification will become publicly discoverable via verifiable transparency, which is also the third foundational requirement.

Foundational requirements mandates users and security researchers to be able to audit Private Processing to verify the security and privacy claims made by Meta. Further, non-targetability and stateless processing and forward security are two additional layers of requirements treated as core to Private Processing on WhatsApp.