Meta rejects Tehran’s claims on location tracking

United States-based technology company Meta on Wednesday said it does not “track the precise location” of the users of its messaging platform WhatsApp, reported CBS News.

Earlier in the day, Iran reportedly asked its citizens to stop using WhatsApp, Telegram and other “location-based applications”, accusing them of being Israel’s “main methods to identify and target individuals”.

This came against the backdrop of the conflict between Israel and Iran entering its sixth day. The countries have launched fresh attacks on each other.

Here is more on this and other top updates:

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram, said on Tuesday that the “false reports” from Iran will be an excuse for its services to be blocked in the country “at a time when people need them the most”. It stated that all of the messages sent via WhatsApp are “end-to-end encrypted meaning no-one except the sender and recipient has access to those messages, not even WhatsApp”. “We do not provide bulk information to any government,” the tech firm said.
The statement came after the Islamic Republic News Agency urged citizens to deactivate or delete their WhatsApp accounts because the “Zionist regime is using citizens’ information to harm us”, Al Jazeera reported.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said his nation would never surrender as demanded by United States President Donald Trump. A day earlier, Trump had demanded Iran’s “unconditional” surrender amid its conflict with Israel. The US president also claimed that Khamenei was in hiding and that Washington knew about his whereabouts. In a speech read on state television on Wednesday, Khamenei said: “America should know that any military intervention will undoubtedly result in irreparable damage.”
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov warned that direct US military assistance to Israel could radically destabilise the situation in West Asia, Reuters reported. In separate comments, the head of Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence service, Sergei Naryshkin, was quoted as saying that the situation between Iran and Israel was now critical.
Two buildings housing manufacturing sites for centrifuge components for Iran’s nuclear programme have been destroyed at Karaj, just outside the capital Tehran, AFP quoted the International Atomic Energy Agency as saying. The UN agency’s announcement came hours after Israel’s military said it had carried out a series of air strikes in and around Tehran.
Israeli strikes have killed at least 585 people in Iran and wounded 1,326 others, reported the Associated Press. A Washington-based group, Human Rights Activists, said it had identified 239 of the dead as civilians and 126 as security personnel.