New privacy hires at WhatsApp: Nate Cardozo (EFF), Robyn Greene (Open Technology Institute)

This bodes well for WhatsApp users.

Attorney Nate Cardozo of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (for the last 6 years!) and Robyn Greene from the Open Technology Institute are among new privacy team hires at social networking company WhatsApp, which is owned by Facebook. Cardozo announced the move on a Facebook post, Greene announced her news in a tweet.

Cardozo announced the move in a post to Facebook on Tuesday:

Personal news! After six and a half years at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), I’ll be leaving at the end of next week. I’m incredibly sad to be leaving such a great organization and I’ll miss my colleagues with all my heart.

Where to? Starting 2/19, I’ll be the Privacy Policy Manager for WhatsApp!! I could NOT be more excited.

If you know me at all, you’ll know this isn’t a move I’d make lightly. After the privacy beating Facebook’s taken over the last year, I was skeptical too. But the privacy team I’ll be joining knows me well, and knows exactly how I feel about tech policy, privacy, and encrypted messaging. And that’s who they want at managing privacy at WhatsApp. I couldn’t pass up that opportunity.

It’s going to be an enormous challenge professionally but I’m ready for it.

Taylor Hatmaker at TechCrunch:

In an effort to bolster its public credibility in the wake of a very rough year, Facebook is bringing a fierce former critic into the fold.

Next month, longtime Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) counsel Nate Cardozo will join WhatsApp, Facebook’s encrypted chat app. Cardozo most recently held the position of Senior Information Security Counsel with the EFF where he worked closely with the organization on cybersecurity policy. As his bio there reads, Cardozo is “an expert in technology law and civil liberties” and already works with private companies on privacy policies that protect user rights.

Robyn Greene will focus on law enforcement access and data protection in her new role with Facebook.