Facebook's popular messaging service WhatsApp is dropping its token $1 fee still levied on some users as it experiments with making businesses pay to reach their customers, Chief Executive Jan Koum said on Monday. In addition, the service expects in the coming months to offer complete encryption of messages, a move that could face the opposition from the authorities in the United States and Britain.

WhatsApp, the service that offers free text, picture and video messages, has been slowly working to develop end-to-end encrypted communications services for more than a year. It has already introduced full encryption for users on Android phones.

WhatsApp is also testing making restaurants, airlines and credit card firms pay to contact consumers.

Speaking at the annual Digital-Life-Design (DLD) conference in Munich, Koum announced that WhatsApp was going to be free to users, and that making customers pay even small amounts remained difficult in many countries where access to credit cards and bank accounts for making online payments remains complicated.

Koum unveiled that the company will begin experimenting this year to simplify how businesses interact with consumers.