The most popular messaging app proves its title by revealing its user stats yesterday for the first time in two years. The company announced in a blog post that it has officially connected over 2 billion people worldwide.

Despite being owned by Facebook, which still has about half a billion more users, told by CEO Will Cathcart, the company will continue to operate separately from its holder. Another thing mentioned in the blog post was WhatsApp’s concerns surrounding its encryption service, stating that “strong encryption is a necessity in modern life” and ensuring that it will continue to offer end-to-end encryption.