The CEO/co-founder of WhatsApp, Jan Koum is leaving the company over disagreements about privacy and encryption. Jan Koum will also step down from Fac
The CEO/co-founder of WhatsApp, Jan Koum is leaving the company over disagreements about privacy and encryption. Jan Koum will also step down from Facebook’s board of directors, a role he negotiated when WhatsApp was acquired by Facebook for $19bn in 2014, according to the Washington Post.
Jan Koum and his co-founder, Brian Acton developed WhatsApp with a focus on user privacy and a disdain for advertising. When it was bought by Facebook, he promised users that these values wouldn’t be compromised.
“You can still count on absolutely no ads interrupting your communication. There would have been no partnership between our two companies if we had to compromise on the core principles that will always define our company, our vision and our product,” he said at the time.
However, Facebook has been under pressure to make money out of WhatsApp, which now has 1.5 billion monthly users. Koum announced his departure from the company via his Facebook account, writing: “It’s been almost a decade since Brian [Acton] 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.
