Another Thorn on Its Back for FBI with User Data Encryption by WhatsApp
Following Apple's refusal to assist the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to gain access into the iPhone of the San Bernardino terrorism suspect Syed Farook, the government agency will have one more potential difficulty in similar cases in the future. Facebook-owned WhatsApp has applied end-to-end encryption on all devices, iOS or Android and other devices, which have WhatsApp installed.
With the instant messaging service employing encryption, messages leaving the sender's device are scrambled, and only the recipients' device can decrypt these. And if messages are intercepted, they become unreadable.
Not only that, voice calls and file transfers will also be encrypted. It has been said that, contrary to claims by the FBI that encryption poses safety issues to the public, encryption in fact keeps criminals and hackers at bay, since not even the company which owns the app can get around the encryption protocols.
Get Our Latest News for FREE
The WhatsApp company is serious about protecting privacy and free speech and has said in an interview with BBC that "The idea is simple: when you send a message, the only person who can read it is the person or group chat that you send that message to. No one can see inside that message. Not cybercriminals. Not hackers. Not oppressive regimes. Not even us."
Those with the newest version of the app were told of the changes on April 5; the app encryption is a default setting. This has been seen as a powerful move that allows the globally billion-strong WhatsApp following unencumbered, free, and fearless expression.
But FBI attorney, General Counsel James Baker, believes that costs in public safety could be high where criminals including terrorists take advantage of the protection via the service.
He tells US News, "If the public does nothing, encryption like that will continue to roll out. It has public safety costs … Do they want the public to bear those costs? Do they want the victims of terrorism to bear those costs?"
On the WhatsApp blog post page, the app's co-founders, Brian Acton and Jan Koum, declare that any information shared through the app will have "cybersecurity" benefits of encryption. The only ones to access an exchange of information would be those sending each other messages. The two tell users of the service that there will now be protection from hackers and "oppressive regimes" from accessing private information.
With this move, WhatsApp has effectively stonewalled any entity which may seek to pressure them to encroach into people's privacy.
Yet, there have also been questions as to whether the service is really providing zero access to outsiders or those not meant to be privy to the information shared among users. Whereas third-party access may be blocked by encryption, the company providing the service may retain some information regarding certain details of the communications being made through the app.
For instance, as the WhatsApp privacy statement reads, "WhatsApp may retain date and time stamp information associated with successfully delivered messages and the mobile phone numbers involved in the messages, as well as any other information which WhatsApp is legally compelled to collect."
The statement also indicates that any files sent over the encrypted service may be retained for a certain period of time, thereafter being deleted of "identifiable" information according to the retention policies of the service.
End-to-end encryption is only the beginning of ensuring privacy and free expression for every single individual and may be a long way yet from being perfect security measure.
