Suddenly, There’s a Blue Button: Meta’s New AI Assistant Rolls Out Across WhatsApp, Instagram, and Facebook
It’s here—whether you like it or not. A small but noticeable blue button has appeared inside the apps you probably use every day. WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook—tap it, and you’re chatting with Meta AI, the company’s generative assistant powered by Llama 3.
How it works: AI in your pocket, always on
On WhatsApp, Meta AI appears as a dedicated chat thread. You can also summon it in group chats by tagging@Meta AI. It answers instantly, pulls info from the web, rewrites your messages, or even helps brainstorm ideas.
It’s available in multiple languages—English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Italian—and early reports show it’s already active in regions like Europe, India, South Africa, and Australia.
But what about privacy?
Here’s the twist: while Meta says your regular messages remain end-to-end encrypted, conversations with the AI assistant are treated differently. According to Meta’s AI privacy documentation, your chats with Meta AI may be stored and used to improve future models. In short: don’t share personal stuff with the bot. If you want to wipe your chat history, you can type/reset-ai to clear a single conversation or /reset-all-ais to nuke everything. But here’s the catch: there’s no official way to remove or hide the AI button itself—a design choice that has already sparked backlash online.
Reactions: Half hype, half outrage
