Meta axes cross-messaging between Instagram and Facebook

Meta has updated its support pages, revealing that users on Instagram will no longer be able to message their Facebook contacts. The company announced that this feature will be discontinued in mid-December, although the exact date was not specified. According to the support page, users will lose the ability to initiate new cross-platform conversations, and existing chats on Instagram will become read-only.

Introduced in 2020, cross-platform messaging on Instagram allowed users to connect with their Facebook contacts. After three years and the addition of features such as group chat, Meta has decided to shut down this feature without much publicity. The company did not provide a specific reason for discontinuing the cross-platform messaging feature. It's worth noting that the European Union's Digital Markets Act mandates interoperability among large messaging apps.

In September, reports indicated that Meta-owned WhatsApp was working on an interoperability feature, in compliance with the Digital Markets Act. Additionally, Meta had previously announced plans to enable end-to-end encryption for Messenger users by default by the end of the year. Although Meta stated that Instagram Direct Messages would also receive this protection after the Messenger rollout, there is no immediate clarification on whether the discontinuation of cross-platform messaging is linked to this initiative.