Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by martinko 3580 days ago
Remind me, was that before or after they enabled end-to-end encryption?
2 comments

Since WhatsApp is virtually a blackbox, their word for end-to-end encryption means nothing. Few 'bugs' in implementation and you have a nice backdoor.
True, but it would at least give them plausible deniability that they couldn't hand over plaintext messages, even if they wanted to.
That's probably the entire purpose behind WhatsApp "encryption": to have their cake and eat it too.
> Few 'bugs' in implementation and you have a nice backdoor.

This holds regardless of whether WhatsApp is a blackbox or not. Now, that doesn't make the claim of end-to-end encryption verifiable, but if you take Facebook's word for it, the bug bounty should be about as good a stalwart as there is against implementation bugs.

> Few 'bugs' in implementation and you have a nice backdoor.

Just one would be enough, methinks.

It's kind of complicated. There were Brazilian bans in 2015 and 2016. Whatsapp has had encryption since 2012 but it was a bit half arsed. It now seems good. I guess the courts could still order the metadata of who's been calling who though. It's a bit unclear what exactly the courts did order.