WhatsApp has had encryption for a while now (as early as 2012), but it was only limited to one-to-one text messages, on Android. That is, until April 5th 2016, when the company announced that “every form of communication” on WhatsApp is now encrypted, end-to-end.
This new end-to-end encryption requires the latest version of WhatsApp, naturally. When both sides of the party have the latest app build, every form of communication on WhatsApp is encrypted, including good ol’ text message, voice call, photo, video, voice messages, and even files, for both one-to-one communication as well as on group chats. The best part is that this new feature is enable by default, and no action is required from your end other than to keep your app updated (and to get the other party you’re communicating with to update their WhatsApp too).
WhatsApp said that the idea behind this is simple — it wants to create a way a safe and secure way for people to communicate, where no one can eavesdrop on — not black hat hackers, not over-reaching governments, and not even WhatsApp itself.
WhatsApp goes on explaining further that other messaging apps only encrypt messages between you and themselves, meaning, the messaging service provider could, if they choose to, read your messages. WhatsApp’s encryption is done end-to-end, and only the sender and the recipient have the keys, therefore even WhatsApp itself cannot decrypt them. For added protection, every single message sent will have its own unique lock and key. WhatsApp also provided an in-depth technical white paper which you can download and read more about here [PDF].
Once you and the opposite party have your WhatsApp installs updated, you’ll see the message above that reads, “Messages you send to this chat and calls are now secured with end-to-end encryption.” If you’re unsure or would like to confirm that your communication is now encrypted end-to-end, just go to the contact/group info a particular WhatsApp message and it should display the status of the encryption.
Jan Koum, WhatsApp co-founder said in the announcement blog post that he grew up in the communist rule of USSR, and the fact that people couldn’t speak freely there, is one of the reasons his family emigrated to the United States. Probably also one of the reasons that drove Koum and his partner Brian Acton to co-found WhatsApp in January 2010, six years ago.
The end-to-end encryption WhatsApp adopts today is the result of its partnership with Open Whisper Systems back in November 18th 2014. Later in April 2015, it was confirmed by Heise Security that Android-to-Android messages were already encrypted, but folks on iOS are still not protected. It took WhatsApp and Open Whisper Systems an additional year to be able to finally complete this phase, and hence the announcement. WhatsApp uses the same Signal Protocol for its end-to-end encryption as the Signal app by Open Whisper Systems. The protocol library is also open-source and published under the GPLv3 license.
This news is particularly a big deal because there are now over 1 billion WhatsApp users, more than parent company Facebook’s own Facebook Messenger, which just reached 900 million active users. As big as WeChat and even Instagram are, they each only have 700 million and 400 million users respectively. WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption ensures that its 1 billion users are all automatically protected from snoops, without regular users even realizing.
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