Facebook To Add "Unsend" Message Feature After Zuckerberg Caught Deleting Chats

Yesterday, we had informed you how Facebook had deleted Mark Zuckerberg’s messages from recipients’ inboxes. Now, a spokesperson for Facebook has confirmed the addition of a new ‘unsend’ feature which will allow you delete messages just like Zuckerberg does.

At present, Facebook Messenger offers a Secret Conversation mode where you can enable a self-destruct timer to delete all of your messages after a specified time. All the recipients of the conversation are also notified about the expiry time of the chats.

But the ‘Unsend’ message feature will now allow you to delete messages selectively from the recipient’s inboxes. However, this feature was announced only after questions were raised on the special treatment meted out to Zuckerberg’s messages — which violates Facebook’s policy.

The official statement issued to us by a Messenger spokesperson reads:

“We have discussed this feature several times. And people using our secret message feature in the encrypted version of Messenger have the ability to set a timer — and have their messages automatically deleted. We will now be making a broader delete message feature available. This may take some time. And until this feature is ready, we will no longer be deleting any executives’ messages. We should have done this sooner — and we’re sorry that we did not.”

Even though Facebook has apologized for not releasing this feature sooner, the retraction of CEO’s messages can be still viewed as a breach of trust by several users. The company has also assured that it won’t delete any messages sent by its executive employees until the Unsend feature is released for everyone.

It is quite clear that Facebook is trying to normalize the situation and make it look like it wasn’t a big deal. In fact, this hurried announcement seems to be an attempt to wane the criticism it would receive by offering this facility to all the users.