Is Wickr shutting down in 2023? Amazon Web Services owns the free, secure texting software Wickr Me. The last day to use this app is December 31, 2023. Wickr has announced on its website that it will stop accepting new account registrations on December 31, 2022, and then shut down entirely in 2023.
Wickr, an American software company, is headquartered in New York City. The company is best known for its titular instant messaging service. The Wickr instant messaging programme allows users to send and receive end-to-end encrypted, content-expiring conversations with files, photos, and videos as attachments.
Mac, Windows, Linux, iOS, and Android operating systems are all supported by the software. On June 25, 2021, Wickr was acquired by Amazon Web Services. We will discuss the reasons for Wicker’s shutdown in this article.
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Is Wickr me shutting down in 2023?
Wickr was established in 2011 and was among the first widely used end-to-end encrypted messaging apps until Amazon Web Services purchased it in 2021. Wickr Me will permanently close on December 31, 2023, according to a statement published by Amazon.
Only the customer version of Wickr will be affected by the closure. It has gained popularity among journalists and informants seeking to send end-to-end encrypted and self-destructing communications. Wickr’s other services won’t have any impacts, which are aimed at businesses, military organizations, and government organizations.
“After careful thought, we have chosen to discontinue our product, Wickr Me,” Amazon stated. Furthermore, the company was working on enabling Wickr users to communicate safely with people outside of their organization. Amazon will be focusing Wickr’s emphasis on safeguarding their business and public sector clients’ data and interactions with AWS Wickr and Wickr Enterprise.
The decision to shut down comes in response to allegations that criminals could trade pictures of child abuse via the firm’s free messaging service. In June 2022, NBC News reported that Amazon had taken “little” proactive action to deal with the issue, citing court records, law enforcement officials, and campaigners.
Why is Wickr ending?
Initially announced in November, the decision comes from multiple disputes involving the highly secure messaging software. Users could register without providing a phone number or any other details that might be used to identify them. As a result, security-conscious organizations like hackers, drug dealers, and journalists use it.
In a June investigation, NBC News discovered that many people dealing with child sexual assault data were using Wickr Me as their primary product. The study found 72 court instances from the previous five years in which the accused was said to have traded child sex abuse files using Wickr, as it is widely known.
At the time, Wickr was not doing enough to find or disclose the sale of such content on its platform. This is according to law enforcement authorities and a National Center for Missing and Abused Kids member, who spoke to NBC News.
A representative for Amazon Web Services said in a statement given to NBC News in June. He says the company was “dedicated to preventing child sexual abuse material (CSAM) across every area of our business.” This includes Wickr, which upholds strong terms of use prohibiting the criminal activity. In response to information about illegal activity, we take swift action, agree with demands from law enforcement authorities, and implement the necessary measures.
Also, any person whose account is discovered to violate its terms will have it terminated. Wickr cooperates with law enforcement authorities on these important issues, according to the spokeswoman.
Is Wickr discontinued now?
In 2012, the Wickr Me app was released. According to its inventors, 256-bit authorized end-to-end encryption is used to make secure messages. Also, the company needs to possess the key needed to decode them. According to Wickr, it would “require trillions of years” to decrypt any credentials.
Because of its high-strength encryption, Wickr has agreements with the US Department of Defense (DoD) to provide highly secure services to the US government. Amazon Web Services bought Wickr, the software startup that created the Wickr Me app, in 2021.
Wickr’s secure chat services also attracted illegal activities, raising worries about the app’s acceptance by drug smugglers and other sketchy characters. The shutdown notification states that Wickr will only concentrate on corporate clients in the private and public sectors.
Conclusion
In its shutdown notice post, the business said it was focusing on allowing commercial and public sector customers to interact with specific people outside of their system on AWS Wickr. In the following months, Wickr said it would provide further details on the steps current Wickr Me users may take to protect their data.
The most widely used free encrypted messaging platform on the planet is still WhatsApp. Signal and Telegram are also very well-liked alternatives. Signal recently made the
The announcement was that it would stop supporting unsecured SMS in its Android app and that it was developing a feature similar to Instagram stories.