Current Whatsapp CEO and known tech billionaire Mr. Jan Koum, who came to the US as an immigrant from Ukraine and co-founded Whatsapp in 2009 together with Stanford alumnus Mr. Brian Acton, is leaving the company after reported clashes with his new bosses at Facebook.
Mr. Koum and Mr. Acton decided to sell Whatsapp, the popular messaging service, in 2014 to Facebook for $19bn.
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Mr. Koum and Facebook’s board, of which he is a member, have reportedly clashed over Facebook’s attempts to use the Whatsapp personal data and weaken its encryption.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum is leaving Facebook after clashing over data privacy <a href="https://t.co/iQ0y6ksGji">https://t.co/iQ0y6ksGji</a> <a href="https://t.co/xuXAU7drGz">pic.twitter.com/xuXAU7drGz</a></p>— The Verge (@verge) <a href="https://twitter.com/verge/status/991068263386886145?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 30, 2018</a></blockquote>
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His colleague Brian Acton, who had already left in November 2017, famously launched the #Deletefacebook hashtag a few months ago in succession of the Cambridge Analytica scandal using Facebook’s user data.
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Just last year, the European Commission decided to fine Facebook some $122m for "providing incorrect or misleading information" over the WhatsApp acquisition.
Facebook CEO Mr. Mark Zuckerberg commented on Mr. Koum’s departure, saying the Whatsapp co-founder had learned him a lot about encryption "and its ability to take power from centralized systems and put it back in people's hands. Those values will always be at the heart of WhatsApp."
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Next, obtrusive ads on WhatsApp! <br>‘Koum was also angered by Facebook executives pushing for a weakening of WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption in order to facilitate its new WhatsApp For Business program’<br>Facebook only cares about the money,not our privacy.<a href="https://t.co/voDPoofjbz">https://t.co/voDPoofjbz</a></p>— Divya Spandana/Ramya (@divyaspandana) <a href="https://twitter.com/divyaspandana/status/991174061022679040?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 1, 2018</a></blockquote>
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Meanwhile, Mr. Koum posted a message announcing his departure from Facebook: “It's been almost a decade since Brian and I started WhatsApp, and it's been an amazing journey with some of the best people. But it is time for me to move on. I've been blessed to work with such an incredibly small team and see how a crazy amount of focus can produce an app used by so many people all over the world.”
“I'm leaving at a time when people are using WhatsApp in more ways than I could have imagined. The team is stronger than ever and it'll continue to do amazing things. I'm taking some time off to do things I enjoy outside of technology, such as collecting rare air-cooled Porsches, working on my cars and playing ultimate frisbee. And I'll still be cheering WhatsApp on – just from the outside. Thanks to everyone who has made this journey possible.”
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