Billionaire Elon Musk has launched a sharp attack on Meta-owned WhatsApp after whistleblowers and legal filings raised fresh questions over the platform’s privacy claims.

Taking to X, Musk warned users against relying on WhatsApp’s security assurances. "WhatsApp is not secure. Even Signal is questionable. Use Chat," he wrote. He also shared a post detailing the allegations against WhatsApp.

His remarks come as Meta Platforms faces a class-action lawsuit in the United States, accusing the company of misleading billions of WhatsApp users about the privacy of their messages.

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According to a Bloomberg report, an international group of plaintiffs has sued Meta in the US District Court in San Francisco, alleging that the company falsely claims WhatsApp provides end-to-end encryption that prevents the company from accessing user messages.

Meta has long promoted “end-to-end” encryption as a core WhatsApp feature, describing it as a security system where messages are accessible only to the sender and recipient, and not even the company itself. However, the lawsuit challenges these assurances.

The plaintiffs allege that Meta and WhatsApp “store, analyse, and can access virtually all of WhatsApp users’ purportedly ‘private’ communications” and accuse the companies and their leadership of defrauding WhatsApp’s billions of users worldwide.

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The class-action complaint, filed in the US District Court for Northern California, represents users from India, Brazil, Australia, Mexico and South Africa. It further alleges that the company retains the ability to decrypt and review message content for internal monitoring and data analysis, contradicting its encryption claims.

Responding to the lawsuit, a Meta spokesperson dismissed the allegations.

The lawsuit is “frivolous” and the company “will pursue sanctions against plaintiffs’ counsel,” the spokesperson said.

Meta acquired WhatsApp in 2014 and has since positioned privacy and encryption as central to the platform’s identity. The latest legal challenge and Musk’s public criticism now place those claims under renewed global scrutiny.