WhatsApp

WhatsApp, founded in 2009 by ex-Yahoo employees Jan Koum and Brian Acton, began as a humble messaging app before morphing into the global behemoth that made SMS look like a relic. By the time Facebook swooped in with a $19 billion offer in 2014, WhatsApp was already a verb, with its end-to-end encryption turning governments everywhere a lovely shade of pale. While Koum and Acton preached privacy, the Facebook acquisition raised eyebrows, as the social media giant’s data-hungry reputation clashed with WhatsApp’s minimalist ethos. Still, the app has amassed over 2 billion users, making it indispensable to anyone with a smartphone and a pulse. Its legacy? A Silicon Valley fairytale, complete with the inevitable sellout, where even the most utopian ideals are just a few billion dollars away from being compromised. WhatsApp may still be king of the messaging apps, but its crown comes with more than a few cracks.