Is this some simple virtue signaling (for closed source app) directed at users that are not technically inclined? I didn’t see this being promoted at this level in any other app.

  • drcouzelisEnglish
    25·
    10 months ago

    From what I understand, WhatsApp does have proper end to end encryption, which means messages can only be read by the sender and recipient. It’s a very good thing, and SHOULD be promoted in my opinion.

    But that doesn’t mean WhatsApp respects your privacy. Even though the messages are encrypted, the actual app is still collecting and scraping every little piece of info about you possible. Think location, IP addresses, your contacts, what’s in your clipboard, camera, mic… I don’t know the details, but that’s where the privacy concerns come from.

    • kyub@discuss.tchncs.de
      81·
      10 months ago

      Yes, though since it’s closed source, contains other proprietary libraries and probably was never properly audited (by a 3rd party) it’s possible (even likely, considering it’s Meta we’re talking about) that they keep a copy of the private key(s) and the messages, so that they’re able to decrypt them, and so still be able to gather the content, in addition to everything else, while they can publicly claim it’s all Signal’s protocol so everything’s “E2E”. And yes, the app also gathers a lot of other data (actual and metadata) besides the content of the messages (which Meta can’t supposedly see since it’s E2E, but I never trust anything from Meta). A Meta app (or Google, or MS, for that matter) should generate the same sort of privacy outrages and media/politics attention like TikTok does, but somehow they don’t. “Same shit, different country” was never so fitting.

      Here’s a very good messenger comparison: https://www.messenger-matrix.de/messenger-matrix-en.html

    • NarrativeBear@lemmy.world
      2·
      10 months ago

      BBM and Signal also have full supported encryption in transit and end to end.

      In these both instances the messages sent are only able to be read by by the recipients. If anyone gains access to Blackberry or signals servers the messages would be unreadable.