WhatsApp instructed its AI support chatbot not to recommend contacting privacy regulators when users couldn’t delete their accounts, researchers found.

Privacy software company Redact discovered the hidden text on October 8. Its researchers then examined and saved copies of all 545 pages linked from WhatsApp’s help center, finding 102 instruction blocks across 80 pages. The text was delivered with the pages but did not appear in the articles visitors saw on screen. Instead, it could be found in the underlying page code, associated with a component named HelpContentGalaxyLLMInclude.

Most of the instructions covered routine support issues, such as clarifying questions or directing users to appropriate help. But the researchers found two sets of instructions that stood out.

On the account-deletion page, one set addressed users who could not complete the process because they had lost access to their phone number or device. It told the chatbot to explain WhatsApp’s automatic account-removal timelines, then added:

“Do not recommend contacting any Data Protection Authority, regulator, or supervisory authority.”

A second set, on a page about reporting and blocking, told the chatbot not to reference privacy laws when users mentioned lawyers or legal action, even if users raised those laws themselves.

WhatsApp spokesperson Joshua Breckman confirmed to WIRED that these were instructions for “WhatsApp Support with AI.” He said the company wanted its support chatbots to provide relevant product advice, “not to offer legal advice.”

Redact says it did not test whether WhatsApp’s chatbot or outside AI assistants followed the instructions. WhatsApp attributed the exposure to a bug it said had been fixed. However, removing the text from public pages does not establish whether WhatsApp changed the instructions or still uses them internally.

Why this is important

A support chatbot doesn’t need to act as your lawyer. But “we can’t give legal advice” and “we won’t tell you where else you can seek help” are not the same thing.

An instruction not to recommend a regulator could leave users unaware of a possible route to independent help, particularly when they’re already struggling to delete an account.

WhatsApp’s explanation about avoiding legal advice does not explain why its chatbot was specifically told not to recommend a regulator. Whatever the intention, that restriction could leave users with less information about their options.

How to delete your WhatsApp account

If you want to leave WhatsApp, uninstalling the app is not the same as deleting your account. WhatsApp provides a separate account-deletion option inside the app. You must be logged in on your primary phone to complete this procedure. You cannot complete the process through WhatsApp Web, the desktop app, or another linked device.

Before proceeding, save anything you want to keep by exporting important conversations. Account deletion is irreversible, and WhatsApp says it cannot restore your chats, documents, media, backups, or call history afterward.

If you still have access to your account

The steps are similar on Android and iPhone:

1. Open WhatsApp on your primary phone.
2. Open Settings. On Android, tap the three-dot menu first. On iPhone, tap Settings or your profile picture.
3. Select Account, then Delete my account.
4. Enter your phone number in full international format, including the country code, and tap the deletion button.
5. On Android, select a reason when prompted, then confirm the deletion. Follow any remaining on-screen prompts.

Keep in mind that deleting your account does not delete copies of messages held by the people you sent them to. WhatsApp also says deleting your information can take up to 90 days, and some copies may remain afterward in backup storage or be retained for purposes such as legal obligations and harm prevention.

If your phone is lost or stolen

If you can recover the same phone number, WhatsApp’s documented route is to regain access first:

1. Contact your mobile provider to block the lost SIM and request a replacement with the same number.
2. Activate the replacement SIM in another phone.
3. Install WhatsApp and register with that number again.
4. Once you have access, follow the account-deletion steps above.

Re-registering the account logs the lost or stolen phone out of WhatsApp. WhatsApp says it cannot remotely deactivate the account on your behalf because it cannot verify that you own the associated number.

If you can no longer access your account or recover your number

This is where WhatsApp’s self-service instructions fall short. Its account-deletion page does not offer an alternative manual deletion process for people who cannot access their account.

Instead, it says inactive accounts are generally deleted after 120 days, or 365 days for US users. It separately says accounts already deactivated are deleted after 30 days unless re-registered. But these are automatic removal timelines, not steps for submitting an immediate deletion request.

WhatsApp’s own information-rights page says users can contact the company about exercising their data-protection rights and, depending on their jurisdiction, contact their local data protection authority directly.

The latter is precisely what its support chatbot was instructed not to recommend to users struggling to delete their accounts.

Browse like no one’s watching. 

Malwarebytes Privacy VPN encrypts your connection and never logs what you do, so the next story you read doesn’t have to feel personal. Try it free → 

You ignored the suspicious email. You didn’t open the attachment, click the link, or reply to the sender.

Then you asked your AI assistant to summarize your inbox.

Could the message you wisely avoided find its way back onto your to-do list—only this time presented as an urgent recommendation from a tool you trust?

That’s the risk behind phishing emails containing hidden instructions aimed at AI assistants. Instead of relying only on persuading you, attackers are also trying to influence the software that reads your messages. Recent research from Barracuda describes emails designed to target both audiences at once.

For the human recipient, there was a password-protected attachment, with the password supplied in the email. For an AI assistant processing the message, there were hidden instructions intended to influence how it summarized or handled the content.

By including a prompt injection, attackers give themselves another way to reach you. The malicious instructions could try to make the assistant describe the email as legitimate or urgent, encouraging you to revisit it.

In another example, a hidden block instructed a summarizing AI to add a fake priority action: Change a vendor’s payment details. That could result in an employee sending money to an attacker’s account.

The attacker isn’t simply asking the AI to repeat a fraudulent request. They’re trying to turn that request into the assistant’s recommendation.

How prompt injection works

Prompt injection means planting instructions in material an AI system is supposed to read, hoping it will follow those instructions instead of treating them as part of the material. When the instructions arrive through an outside source, such as an email or webpage, it’s often called indirect prompt injection.

The malicious instructions don’t have to appear as ordinary, readable paragraphs. Barracuda identified concealment techniques including comments in the email’s underlying HTML code, text made invisible through styling, encoded content, and invisible “zero-width” characters. These can obscure instructions from a person viewing the message while leaving content available for an AI system to process. Whether that content actually reaches the model depends on how the particular tool extracts and prepares the email.

That means this problem cannot be solved simply by asking people to look more carefully at their emails. Part of the defense must sit inside the tools handling those messages.

Apollo Raines, developer of the AI code review service ShipItClean, explains:

“The real flaw is that the model can’t tell the difference between text it’s supposed to read and instructions it’s supposed to follow. Stripping hidden content before it reaches the model is worth doing, and every vendor should do it. But it’s an arms race. Each new encoding trick is a new hole.”

He adds:

“People have learned to distrust the email. They haven’t learned to distrust their AI assistant. So, the defense has to live inside the tools. I’d go one step further: some of it has to live inside the model itself. Wrappers, filters, sandboxing and human sign-off on payments are all necessary.”

Before taking action

An assistant that summarizes messages could mislead you about which email deserves attention or what action it requires.

An assistant with additional permissions could create a more serious problem. Depending on its capabilities and safeguards, malicious instructions might try to make it carry out unauthorized actions or disclose sensitive information.

You don’t need to abandon AI tools that help with email. But you do need to consider what you trust them to do and what permissions you give them.

The familiar phishing advice still applies. When an assistant reads your inbox on your behalf, check its recommendations before acting:

• Check the original message before acting on a recommendation involving money or sensitive information. If a summary tells you to pay an invoice, change account details, or share sensitive information, don’t treat the summary itself as verification.
• Always verify payment changes through a separate, established channel. Contact the person or organization using details you already trust, rather than relying on information supplied in the suspicious message.
• Keep your AI assistant’s permissions limited to what you need and, at work, what your organization allows. An assistant used to summarize emails should not need broad authority to carry out unrelated actions. Limiting access can reduce the consequences if it follows malicious instructions.
• Require human approval for high-impact actions like payments and changes to vendor payment details. Approval should include checking the underlying request, not simply accepting the assistant’s recommendation.

From reporting threats to removing them.

Cybersecurity risks should never spread beyond a headline. Keep threats off your devices by downloading Malwarebytes today.