Malcolm Turnbull texts during parliament sitting. Photo: Getty Images

Government ministers have reportedly been communicating through a secret social media app which sends private messages that can be anonymous, self-destructing and untraceable.

Encrypted peer-to-peer messaging app, Wickr, lets users transfer data, text and files through a secure exchange server.

Secret messages, pictures, videos, audios files and documents can be sent and received through the app, which does not collect personal information, and can be made to expire after a nominal period of time. Users can connect with others without uploading contact lists, chat with group of up to 10 people and “shred” their device of any deleted materials.

The Australian reports politicians including Malcolm Turnbull, Scott Morrison and Alex Hawke use the free service as a means of private communication.

Australian politicians favoured the app when discussing last month’s spill movement and continue to use it to debate the ongoing leadership crisis.

In an age of heightened concerns about privacy there has been a significant rise in the use of secret messaging apps.

Earlier this year, following a series of leaked emails, American billionaire investor Mark Cuban decided to handle negotiations of a new deal over his free texting app Cyber Dust, which features texts that disappear after 30 seconds.

Despite the government’s push to force telcos to store metadata for security purposes, the Wickr app deletes geolocation and identifying information from sent media, meaning there’s no metadata trail available to capture.

Even the US government hasn’t been able to crack the apps military-grade encryption.

Business Insider had equal difficulty attempting to grab a screenshot of the app after we downloaded it.

Image: Wickr

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