Social media giant Facebook has said that it has begun offering an option to encrypt messages

Social media giant Facebook has said that it has begun offering an option to encrypt messages - a way to have secret conversations with other users - to some of 900 million users of Messenger, its messaging app.

The end-to-end encryption is a system that allows only the communicating users to read the messages. The upgrade will prohibit even Facebook from reading users’ conversation.

Facebook introduced end-to-end encryption to one billion users of WhatsApp messaging app in April. Encrypting Messenger is a tougher challenge than WhatsApp because the service is widely used via browsers on personal computers, as well as on smartphones.

While on WhatsApp, the end-to-end encryption is turned on by default, with Messenger users will have to turn on the feature, which hasn’t gone down well with a few.

End-to-end encryption would not immediately be available on Messenger for group conversations, chatbots, payments or videos.