Whatsapp looking for ways to stop spread of fake news

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Popular messaging app WhatsApp on Monday said it is exploring ways to check spread of fake news through its platform.
WhatsApp software engineer Alan Kao termed the situation as "complex" because of the end-to-end encryption of messages on the platform that does not allow anyone -- except the sender and the receiver -- to read the messages.

"We definitely do not want to see fake news on our platform and it's a complex problem in determining what is fake and what isn't. Because of the encryption, we can't read the contents of the messages," Kao told reporters in New Delhi.

He added that the Facebook-owned company is looking at different ways in which they can tweak the product to "try and minimise" fake news.

There have been a number of instances, including rumours of the new currency notes featuring a GPS chip and videos related to Muzaffarnagar riots, that were circulated and shared virally on WhatsApp as many took them to be true.

With over 200 million users, India is the largest market for WhatsApp that has about 1.3 billion users globally.

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