How To Tell If You Have FB Secret Conversations

In a step to help users retain privacy, Facebook launched Secret Conversations, an encryption of your Facebook messages through their messenger app. According to the social media giant, this new addition will protect your conversations from law enforcement and intelligence agencies that might want to take a look at what you are sending. This comes as a welcome relief to those of us with tape over our laptop cameras. But if you want to take advantage of this feature, you must first learn how to tell if you have Facebook Messenger Secret Conversations available to you.

Last spring, WhatsApp implemented this feature on their platform and grew to become the largest end-to-end encrypted messaging network in history. As their parent company, Facebook decided to beta-test this option on their own messaging system back in July. Now that everyone is getting the new iOS 10 update on their phones, this Secret Conversation add-on is available for use.

It is important to note that your secret conversations will only work on one device at a time. Meaning that if you start a secret conversation on your mobile device, it will not appear on your laptop. This added level of security makes it even harder to see what you wrote to outside sources trying to get your information. You are also able to create messages on a timer — permanently deleting themselves after you set it up for a certain amount of time. Finally, both parties inside of the conversation must have this option in order for it to work.

So how can you tell if you have Secret Conversations available on your phone? First you will need to make sure that you have the latest update on iOS on your phone and the latest version of Facebook Messenger app. Once you have updated everything, you should go into your Messenger app and click on the 'me' icon on the bottom right on the screen. This will take you to your profile settings and features.

Once you are there, you will scroll down until you see the Secret Conversations option below Payments. That means you now have this feature on your phone.

If you click on it you can manually turn it on or off yourself.

It right away explains that this feature can only work on one device at a time, and it also allows you to get rid of this option entirely. To start a Secret Conversation with someone, just click on their name inside on your message and select Secret Conversation. At the very top of the screen you will be shown that a secret conversation with the person is taking place.

You can set a timer to delete your message whenever you want, which means less people being able to get access to it. Et voila! Using Secret Conversations is that easy. Now you don't have to worry about anyone stealing your insider baking secrets or XOXO Gossip Girl-ing you ever again.