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At least that's what they tell you. We can't know for sure because it's closed-source.
by jhasse 10y ago
At least that's what they tell you. We can't know for sure because it's closed-source.
- akjainaj 10y agoWhatsApp is as closed as the version of Telegram you download from the (App|Play) Store. Before you say "but I can compile it myself", think of how many people will ever bother to do that.
- throwaway122916 10y agoSame as every other app including Signal. For the record, not advocating using Telegram over Signal.
- d33 10y agoOne would do in order to unearth any backdoors. In case of WhatsApp, that would be more difficult.
- jhasse 10y agoYou can download it from F-Droid where they will compile it from the source for you. Yes, only very few people will use that version, too. But with that logic there isn't any reason for open-source at all.
- tptacek 10y agoNo, we can easily know for sure, despite the fact that it's closed source.
- jhasse 10y agoHow?
- tptacek 10y agoSorry, I don't understand your question.
- jhasse 10y agoHow can you know for sure?
- tptacek 10y agoBy looking at the code.
- jhasse 10y agobut it's closed-source, so we can't do that
- napoleond 10y ago`tptacek is being obtuse, but it really is pretty straightforward: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decompiler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decompiler
- tptacek 10y agoYou understand how frustrating it is for open source advocates to hear that normal users will never look at source code and so there's no practical difference for them between closed source and open source since it's all opaque to them anyways? That's how literally every security person feels about the argument that closed-source software is unknowable. We don't need decompilers or special tools to read closed-source applications. Almost all of them --- very much including the Signal-based messengers --- are built with tools that produce straightforward easy to follow assembly code.