[ghnws]

AFAIK the app code can be decompiled to see what it does. The messaging can be monitored as well. I find it hard to believe these apps could sneak in something that breaks the encryption without anyone noticing.

The proposed solution to stopping child porn from being shared on these platforms would at most only do just that: Stop sharing on these specific apps. There are plenty of alternatives including encrypted zips, TOR etc. Breaking e2ee in WhatsApp would not do anything to stop sharing the material.

I don't think it's a leap to question why this is proposed when it could never achieve it's intended goal.

[camhart]

If the update is targeted at a single individual, it's almost guaranteed to go undetected.

Yes you can decompile code. But reverse engineering is time intensive (I've done it). And these code bases are huge. It wouldn't be difficult to obfuscate some element of the code so it's difficult to detect. Especially if it's rarely triggered.

> The proposed solution to stopping child porn from being shared on these platforms would at most only do just that: Stop sharing on these specific apps. There are plenty of alternatives including encrypted zips, TOR etc. Breaking e2ee in WhatsApp would not do anything to stop sharing the material.

There is value in introducing barriers, even when imperfect. You must admit that, otherwise the fact that Google/Apple can ship an OS update whenever they want negates the entire argument in favor of e2ee.

Also, just FYI encrypted zips are easily brute forced.

[ghnws]

You can not even bruteforce an AES-128 encrypted zip, let alone 7z or rar with stronger algorithms. (Given a decent length password obviously)

> There is value in introducing barriers, even when imperfect.

Not when they are completely ineffective and introduce other issues.