The app also stated that it will soon let the users send disappearing photos and videos, and this week, the feature will roll out to everyone. Anyone who uses the Facebook-owned messaging app can share a photo or video in "view once" mode, meaning that it is viewed just once before the media in question goes poof. Media shared with "view once" selected will appear as opened after the intended audience takes a peek.

New feature alert!

You can now send photos and videos that disappear after they've been opened via View Once on WhatsApp, giving you more control over your chats privacy! pic.twitter.com/Ig5BWbX1Ow

The company says that the new feature could be useful for a range of purposes that definitely aren't sending nudes, like sharing a photo of some clothes you tried on or giving someone your wifi password. In fine print, the company likes to remind you that even though the photos or video will disappear, that doesn't prevent someone from taking a screenshot (and you won't know if they do).

The new feature is a step toward giving users "even more control over their privacy," a song Facebook has been singing since Mark Zuckerberg declared a new "privacy-focused vision" for the company way back in 2019. Since then, Facebook has made a few gestures toward letting people wrest control of their online privacy--streamlining audience controls on its core app and enabling disappearing messages in WhatsApp.

The company has also been talking big about bringing end-to-end encryption to its full stable of messaging services, which it will make interoperable in the future. WhatsApp enabled end-to-end encryption by default as far back as 2016, but for Messenger and Instagram, the hallmark privacy measure could still be years away.