WhatsApp, a communications platform owned by Facebook, just encrypted messages, phone calls and videos on over a billion electronic devices. The move flies in the face of the U.S. government’s ongoing attempts to boost surveillance and curtail our electronic freedoms.

While the FBI is enmeshed in a struggle with Apple over iPhone encryption, WhatsApp just blew the electronic security game wide open with a clear show of defiance to any court-ordered invasion of privacy.

With Apple and WhatsApp on board, we have a massive opportunity to make encryption -- the real protection of our privacy and security -- the new normal. It’s time to call on Microsoft to do the same with Skype.

Will you ask Microsoft to protect our privacy and add end-to-end encryption on Skype?

The FBI wants companies like Apple and WhatsApp to provide them with “back door” access to encrypted files. But back doors virtually negate the purpose of encryption in the first place -- once one person has it, even with the best of intentions, it will eventually fall into the wrong hands. And if WhatsApp gave the U.S. a backdoor, it couldn’t then refuse China, Russia or any other state. Besides -- bad guys would just end up using some other platform anyway.

Make no mistake: this is a brave, courageous stand by WhatsApp and it’s providing us with a huge chance to set this country on the right path toward cyber-freedom. Not even WhatsApp employees can read the files under encryption. Microsoft is the next big player sitting on the fence in this debate. Let’s push it off.

Tell Microsoft to follow WhatsApp’s lead and make Skype encrypted.

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