Signal appoints former Google manager as president
Signal, the encrypted messaging platform, has appointed Meredith Whittaker as its first president, a newly created role in the company.
Signal, the encrypted messaging platform, has appointed Meredith Whittaker as its first president, a newly created role in the company.
Whittaker co-founded the AI Now Institute and Google’s Open Research Group, once organizing a mass walkout of 20,000 Google employees in protest of lack of transparency, non-inclusive workplace culture, and sexual harassment.
The newly appointed president said she will be working together with the company’s leadership on guiding Signal’s strategy, ensuring its financial sustainability, and bettering Signal’s public communications.
“Signal’s developers and designers created an app that honors people’s needs and expectations, while maintaining strict privacy promises. This is something that’s incredibly difficult to do, and that reflects significant vision and humility,” Whittaker said in a blog post.
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Whittaker joined Signal’s board of directors in 2020 and should start her role as president on 12 September.
Signal is considered among the safest communication apps in terms of privacy. Encryption is only one pro-privacy feature of the app, as Signal collects very little metadata.
Signal is run by the Signal Foundation and Signal Messenger LLC.
The app was developed and launched by Moxie Marlinspike, an American cryptographer, in 2014. Four years later, in 2018, Brian Acton joined Signal to help establish the Signal foundation.
Marlinspike resigned as the CEO in early January this year. Acton has been serving as interim CEO since Marlinspike resigned.