7 ms·

End-to-end encryption does not prevent Facebook from accessing WhatsApp chats

173 points by humanetech 8y ago

StavrosK 8y ago
I don't understand this argument. "Facebook control the WhatsApp code, therefore they can do whatever they want, therefore they can read your messages". I mean, yeah, by that metric, Signal could too, and every other encrypted messenger. We never relied on "Facebook can't change the code" for security, so I don't see how this post brings any new information to the table. I don't even know why it goes into backup folder details and things, as if they matter. If Facebook wanted to change the code to read your chats, they wouldn't have to count on the existence of a specially named folder, they could just change the code to send the chats to them directly.
- salasrod 8y ago
  I don't think this is written with purely the technical people in mind. It is written for the people that don't know better and believe end-to-end encryption will always be safe, even though Facebook controls the source code and therefore can do whatever they want.
- jstanley 8y ago
  > I mean, yeah, by that metric, Signal could too, and every other encrypted messenger. Open source ones would be a lot less likely to get away with it.
  - gcthomas 8y ago
    The difference between Signal and Wattsapp is really in all the non-message-contents data that Wattsapp collects, as you can see in their privacy (hah!) policy: ( https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/#privacy-policy-information-we-collect https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/#privacy-policy-information-w...) "(We collect) hardware model, operating system information, battery level, signal strength, app version, browser information, and mobile network, connection information including phone number, mobile operator or ISP, language and time zone, and IP, device operations information, and identifiers like device identifiers (including identifiers unique to Facebook Company Products associated with the same device or account) "...how you interact with others using our Services, and the time, frequency, and duration of your activities and interactions), log files, and diagnostic, crash, website, and performance logs and reports. This also includes information about when you registered to use our Services, the features you use like our messaging, calling, Status, or groups features, profile photo, about information, whether you are online, when you last used our Services (your "last seen"), and when you last updated your about information. "We collect device location information if you use our location features, like when you choose to share your location with your contacts, view locations nearby or those others have shared with you, and the like, and for diagnostics and troubleshooting purposes such as if you are having trouble with our app's location features. We use various technologies to determine location, including IP, GPS, Bluetooth signals, and information about nearby Wi-Fi access points, beacons, and cell towers. "We receive information about you from other users and businesses. For example, when other users or businesses you know use our Services, they may provide your phone number, name, and other information "Businesses you interact with using WhatsApp provide us information about their interactions with you.
    - anticensor 8y ago
      > battery level, signal strength, This reminds me Windows 10 collecting color of the device, in that it is unnecessary for operation but enough to pinpoint a person in combination.
      - crtasm 8y ago
        It asks you what colour your device is? Haven't run into that yet.
        anticensor 8y ago
        It collects without noticing you. There is a chassis color stored in somewhere as I understand it correctly.
  - azahk 8y ago
    Why? These applications are super complex and you can't count on all eyeballs detecting a potential backdoor. And, you don't know if the code in the repo matches what you download from the App Store.
    - xxs 8y ago
      This is a very weak argument, eyeballs do find backdoors. Usually each commit is checked by few people and the introduction of the backdoor is rather obvious. As for not knowing what has been downloading (if someone tempered with), the best approach is compiling it on your own.
      - gaius 8y ago
        This is a very weak argument, eyeballs do find backdoors Eventually, maybe. How many eyeballs and how long to find Heartbleed?
        Coxa 8y ago
        There's a difference between a potential backdoor and a bug. While a lot of eyeballs might oversee a bug, you have to make an effort to design your backdoor to go unnoticed.
        gaius 8y ago
        Good backdoors are indistinguishable from bugs, for plausible deniability
        zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 8y ago
        The question isn't whether there won't ever be backdoors, but how likely that is, how long they will stay in place undetected, and what the effects on the reputation of the product/project/committer are once they are discovered. Bringing this up as an argument is a sensible as claiming that transparency and democracy isn't any better than a dictatorship because there is still corruption.
      - 8y ago
  - MuppetMaster42 8y ago
    If you are being super paranoid... Unless the open source app is transparently built and app store deployed from a public build server, it's very easy for the owner to inject a back-door into it. There's no mechanism built into the app stores to validate an app against its source code. So the owner could checkout master, add a back-door, build and publish to the app stores, and you'd update, never knowing you're exposed. Nothing is 100% safe. It's just dependent on how much trust you assign.
- metildaa 8y ago
  Another angle on this is we have no way to know what is changed in each WhatsApp version. There could be APIs its hitting that leak data, private keys could be getting exported at the behest of a government, etc Commoners have no transparency if Facebook is data mining who they talk to, how often, what type of content and for how long. From the anecdata we have, we know some of this metadata is being mined (contacts at this point).
  - ptx 8y ago
    Are they claiming that contacts are metadata and not data? In that case in seems those framing the debate in terms of "metadata" have already reached the second phase: 1) Claim that no data is harvested, only unimportant metadata that you shouldn't be concerned about, so there is no need to worry! 2) Gradually expand the definition of "metadata" to include all desired data.
    - loup-vaillant 8y ago
      I've always understood timing, origin, and destination of a message to be metadata. I'm on the fence about the size of the message. Only the contents themselves are definitely data. Of course, metadata sometimes contains even more information than the data itself, so framing it as "unimportant" is already incredibly dishonest.
      - xt00 8y ago
        I think the open question is how does Facebook make money and justify their expensive purchase of WhatsApp? It still seems to be an open question years after the acquisition.. i think it is fair to bring up that if Facebook wanted to maybe “parse and target” WhatsApp messages they could and also make the statement that they are encrypted end to end. It does make me chuckle a bit though that there is some debate about if zuck can be assumed to be forthright or not.. the frontline episode about Facebook definitely sort of makes you realize that Facebook and mark zuckerberg at least for a long time thought the world needed to catch up to their super smarter than everybody thinking and hey if there are consequences eh that’s the natural course of things..
- dingaling 8y ago
  I think he was trying to architect a design in which WhatsApp itself wouldn't be exporting the data over the network, which could be spotted through metadata anlaysis. Lower-visibility to slipstream it in with some bulk data. But yes it is an overly complicated mechanism for what would be a simple change by Facebook and one that people have raised here since the original announcement.
- mtgx 8y ago
  Regardless of whether or not WhatsApp could do that secretly, and my guess is it probably has for some governments and against specific individuals, I think the writing is on the wall for Facebook to announce that WhatsApp will drop default end-to-end encryption sometime next year. It's basically why the two WhatsApp co-founders left. Facebook is getting ready to better "monetize" WhatsApp, and they'll get more money by looking at people's messages. So if you haven't already switched to Signal (or better), there's no point in waiting around. WhatsApp's loss of default end-to-end encryption is inevitable and it will come soon.
  - alephu5 8y ago
    I'm currently living in south America and thanks to a lack of net neutrality it's very difficult to not use WhatsApp. For as little as $2 a month you can have unlimited use of WhatsApp, messenger and Waze. SMS and classic phone calls are expensive so individuals, businesses and even universities depend on WhatsApp.
- sergioj97 8y ago
  That's the same I thought. I don't think I fully understand this article.
- maxerickson 8y ago
  People make the same complaint against Signal. I expect it's frequently the same people.
- imglorp 8y ago
  "End to End" needs defining. It's accurate, but disingenuous, to say "we're e2e between us and the clients". Most people would call that the MITM.
- rknintiet 8y ago
  I think the point this atricle is trying to make is that WhatsApp and the Facebook app share the same shared container, meaning Facebook has access to that unencrypted database. So WhatsApp may be fine, but the Facebook app can access your plaintext conversations anytime too
plantfbsdff 8y ago
He is saying data can be access by facebook on your phone since its simply using keychain to store your message and they have access to that keychain. They could theoretically send your entire chat history to facebook. End-to-end encryption does not entail they are not snooping on your phone, just that when the message is sent, it is encrypted.
sarabande 8y ago
I've never programmed for an app store -- what's the security measure that ensures the Signal version you install corresponds to some trusted state of the code base?
- pcl 8y ago
  No such security measures exist in the iOS or Android app stores. I’m not sure whether or not a publisher could opt into providing such assurances, either. You could imagine that with a deterministic build regime, something might be possible, at least if you had rooted your phone so you could directly inspect the install footprint.
- Joeboy 8y ago
  Signal has reproducible builds, which means you can build it from source yourself and confirm that the result is exactly the same as what you got from the app store. Obviously not many people actually do that, but it means google can't start pushing bad versions without a significant risk of getting caught.
November__ 8y ago
Water is wet
Strom 8y ago
There's no need for theoretical chat history leaks, there's already a practical one in place. Online WhatsApp backups aren't encrypted with end-to-end encryption. [1][2] WhatsApp keeps being "helpful" and aggressively suggests users turn on online chat backup, without mentioning on the same screen that this means your chat history will be uploaded without end-to-end encryption. The history is encrypted with a key that is sent to WhatsApp servers. This is used to provide a passwordless backup restore function even when you lose your phone. You contact WhatsApp with your mobile number and WhatsApp sends you back a code that is used to derive the key that was used to encrypt the backup which was sent to Apple/Google. All of this makes Zuckerberg's claims that law enforcement can't read the messages because Facebook can't pretty misleading. Law enforcement could get the backup from Apple/Google and the key from WhatsApp and have access to the whole chat history. There are apps already available to help you through this process. [3] -- [1] Media and messages you back up aren't protected by WhatsApp end-to-end encryption while in iCloud. https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/iphone/20888066/ https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/iphone/20888066/ [2] Media and messages you back up aren't protected by WhatsApp end-to-end encryption while in Google Drive. https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/android/20887921/ https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/android/20887921/ [3] Elcomsoft Explorer for WhatsApp 2.30 can now download and decrypt Android user’s encrypted WhatsApp communication histories https://blog.elcomsoft.com/2018/01/extract-and-decrypt-whatsapp-backups-from-google/ https://blog.elcomsoft.com/2018/01/extract-and-decrypt-whats...
- stalf 8y ago
  Even though I also find it very suspicious that WhatsApp keeps proactively badgering me about turning backup on, I don’t see how this could be exploited by Facebook as the messages are stored in iCloud and Google Drive which it can’t access.
  - jononor 8y ago
    Whatapps needs a Google Drive API token to write that backup, don't they? If so, surely they can read it using the same token?
    - 8y ago
petters 8y ago
> it would take a good iOS developer just a few days to put in place code in both the Facebook and WhatsApp apps that could discretely copy this database from one app to the other, via their shared container. Weird article. If modifying the WhatsApp app is on the table, there are trivial ways to send decrypted messages elsewhere.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
sergioj97 8y ago
I think the encryption thing was more about Facebook not being able to intercept your messages, read/store them, and remain unnoticed. Of course they can "still" read your messages as they could rewrite the app in a few subtle ways to achieve that easily, but that's nothing new. I guess that if the app starts looking for the chats within the devices, it would be much easier to spot than it would if the messages were just analyzed as they went through WhatsApp's servers (so that's what the encryption is for).
sidcool 8y ago
Title is a bit misleading in my opinion. If you back up your chats to Google Drive, they obviously won't be E2E encrypted.
addedlovely 8y ago
Messages may be sent encrypted, but I bet they are analysed before being encrypted. Without an external independent audit I'm not sure I'd trust Zuck.
umairj 8y ago
I have also noticed seeing ads related to my voice calls and images shared over WhatsApp. Has anyone else noticed the same?
samblr 8y ago
Facebook treats our Whatsapp message content just like it's feed. Here is what happened few weeks ago : I exchanged whatsapp messages with a well known founder. Lo and behold - news about him and his startup are all over my facebook feed. Some which was published years ago. We live in echo chambers.
m-p-3 8y ago
End-to-end encryption like these shouldn't be considered private as long as no one else than yourself control the private key. It's not as convenient, but misplacing trust into corporation that has no interest in your privacy is dangerous.
discoball 8y ago
Common sense says that since FB owns WhatsApp no one should trust it. It's no different than if China owned WhatsApp. I mean WeChat. Just common sense.
throwaway648 8y ago
and os companies can install key loggers on your device/machine. and chipset manufacturers can backdoor the system. and so on. no piece of hardware or software is safe from evil deeds of people building them.

173 points by humanetech 8y ago

I don't understand this argument. "Facebook control the WhatsApp code, therefore they can do whatever they want, therefore they can read your messages". I mean, yeah, by that metric, Signal could too, and every other encrypted messenger. We never relied on "Facebook can't change the code" for security, so I don't see how this post brings any new information to the table. I don't even know why it goes into backup folder details and things, as if they matter. If Facebook wanted to change the code to read your chats, they wouldn't have to count on the existence of a specially named folder, they could just change the code to send the chats to them directly.

salasrod 8y ago
I don't think this is written with purely the technical people in mind. It is written for the people that don't know better and believe end-to-end encryption will always be safe, even though Facebook controls the source code and therefore can do whatever they want.
jstanley 8y ago
> I mean, yeah, by that metric, Signal could too, and every other encrypted messenger. Open source ones would be a lot less likely to get away with it.
- gcthomas 8y ago
  The difference between Signal and Wattsapp is really in all the non-message-contents data that Wattsapp collects, as you can see in their privacy (hah!) policy: ( https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/#privacy-policy-information-we-collect https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/#privacy-policy-information-w...) "(We collect) hardware model, operating system information, battery level, signal strength, app version, browser information, and mobile network, connection information including phone number, mobile operator or ISP, language and time zone, and IP, device operations information, and identifiers like device identifiers (including identifiers unique to Facebook Company Products associated with the same device or account) "...how you interact with others using our Services, and the time, frequency, and duration of your activities and interactions), log files, and diagnostic, crash, website, and performance logs and reports. This also includes information about when you registered to use our Services, the features you use like our messaging, calling, Status, or groups features, profile photo, about information, whether you are online, when you last used our Services (your "last seen"), and when you last updated your about information. "We collect device location information if you use our location features, like when you choose to share your location with your contacts, view locations nearby or those others have shared with you, and the like, and for diagnostics and troubleshooting purposes such as if you are having trouble with our app's location features. We use various technologies to determine location, including IP, GPS, Bluetooth signals, and information about nearby Wi-Fi access points, beacons, and cell towers. "We receive information about you from other users and businesses. For example, when other users or businesses you know use our Services, they may provide your phone number, name, and other information "Businesses you interact with using WhatsApp provide us information about their interactions with you.
  - anticensor 8y ago
    > battery level, signal strength, This reminds me Windows 10 collecting color of the device, in that it is unnecessary for operation but enough to pinpoint a person in combination.
    - crtasm 8y ago
      It asks you what colour your device is? Haven't run into that yet.
      - anticensor 8y ago
        It collects without noticing you. There is a chassis color stored in somewhere as I understand it correctly.
- azahk 8y ago
  Why? These applications are super complex and you can't count on all eyeballs detecting a potential backdoor. And, you don't know if the code in the repo matches what you download from the App Store.
  - xxs 8y ago
    This is a very weak argument, eyeballs do find backdoors. Usually each commit is checked by few people and the introduction of the backdoor is rather obvious. As for not knowing what has been downloading (if someone tempered with), the best approach is compiling it on your own.
    - gaius 8y ago
      This is a very weak argument, eyeballs do find backdoors Eventually, maybe. How many eyeballs and how long to find Heartbleed?
      - Coxa 8y ago
        There's a difference between a potential backdoor and a bug. While a lot of eyeballs might oversee a bug, you have to make an effort to design your backdoor to go unnoticed.
        gaius 8y ago
        Good backdoors are indistinguishable from bugs, for plausible deniability
      - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 8y ago
        The question isn't whether there won't ever be backdoors, but how likely that is, how long they will stay in place undetected, and what the effects on the reputation of the product/project/committer are once they are discovered. Bringing this up as an argument is a sensible as claiming that transparency and democracy isn't any better than a dictatorship because there is still corruption.
    - 8y ago
- MuppetMaster42 8y ago
  If you are being super paranoid... Unless the open source app is transparently built and app store deployed from a public build server, it's very easy for the owner to inject a back-door into it. There's no mechanism built into the app stores to validate an app against its source code. So the owner could checkout master, add a back-door, build and publish to the app stores, and you'd update, never knowing you're exposed. Nothing is 100% safe. It's just dependent on how much trust you assign.
metildaa 8y ago
Another angle on this is we have no way to know what is changed in each WhatsApp version. There could be APIs its hitting that leak data, private keys could be getting exported at the behest of a government, etc Commoners have no transparency if Facebook is data mining who they talk to, how often, what type of content and for how long. From the anecdata we have, we know some of this metadata is being mined (contacts at this point).
- ptx 8y ago
  Are they claiming that contacts are metadata and not data? In that case in seems those framing the debate in terms of "metadata" have already reached the second phase: 1) Claim that no data is harvested, only unimportant metadata that you shouldn't be concerned about, so there is no need to worry! 2) Gradually expand the definition of "metadata" to include all desired data.
  - loup-vaillant 8y ago
    I've always understood timing, origin, and destination of a message to be metadata. I'm on the fence about the size of the message. Only the contents themselves are definitely data. Of course, metadata sometimes contains even more information than the data itself, so framing it as "unimportant" is already incredibly dishonest.
    - xt00 8y ago
      I think the open question is how does Facebook make money and justify their expensive purchase of WhatsApp? It still seems to be an open question years after the acquisition.. i think it is fair to bring up that if Facebook wanted to maybe “parse and target” WhatsApp messages they could and also make the statement that they are encrypted end to end. It does make me chuckle a bit though that there is some debate about if zuck can be assumed to be forthright or not.. the frontline episode about Facebook definitely sort of makes you realize that Facebook and mark zuckerberg at least for a long time thought the world needed to catch up to their super smarter than everybody thinking and hey if there are consequences eh that’s the natural course of things..
dingaling 8y ago
I think he was trying to architect a design in which WhatsApp itself wouldn't be exporting the data over the network, which could be spotted through metadata anlaysis. Lower-visibility to slipstream it in with some bulk data. But yes it is an overly complicated mechanism for what would be a simple change by Facebook and one that people have raised here since the original announcement.
mtgx 8y ago
Regardless of whether or not WhatsApp could do that secretly, and my guess is it probably has for some governments and against specific individuals, I think the writing is on the wall for Facebook to announce that WhatsApp will drop default end-to-end encryption sometime next year. It's basically why the two WhatsApp co-founders left. Facebook is getting ready to better "monetize" WhatsApp, and they'll get more money by looking at people's messages. So if you haven't already switched to Signal (or better), there's no point in waiting around. WhatsApp's loss of default end-to-end encryption is inevitable and it will come soon.
- alephu5 8y ago
  I'm currently living in south America and thanks to a lack of net neutrality it's very difficult to not use WhatsApp. For as little as $2 a month you can have unlimited use of WhatsApp, messenger and Waze. SMS and classic phone calls are expensive so individuals, businesses and even universities depend on WhatsApp.
sergioj97 8y ago
That's the same I thought. I don't think I fully understand this article.
maxerickson 8y ago
People make the same complaint against Signal. I expect it's frequently the same people.
imglorp 8y ago
"End to End" needs defining. It's accurate, but disingenuous, to say "we're e2e between us and the clients". Most people would call that the MITM.
rknintiet 8y ago
I think the point this atricle is trying to make is that WhatsApp and the Facebook app share the same shared container, meaning Facebook has access to that unencrypted database. So WhatsApp may be fine, but the Facebook app can access your plaintext conversations anytime too

plantfbsdff 8y ago

He is saying data can be access by facebook on your phone since its simply using keychain to store your message and they have access to that keychain. They could theoretically send your entire chat history to facebook. End-to-end encryption does not entail they are not snooping on your phone, just that when the message is sent, it is encrypted.

sarabande 8y ago

I've never programmed for an app store -- what's the security measure that ensures the Signal version you install corresponds to some trusted state of the code base?

pcl 8y ago
No such security measures exist in the iOS or Android app stores. I’m not sure whether or not a publisher could opt into providing such assurances, either. You could imagine that with a deterministic build regime, something might be possible, at least if you had rooted your phone so you could directly inspect the install footprint.
Joeboy 8y ago
Signal has reproducible builds, which means you can build it from source yourself and confirm that the result is exactly the same as what you got from the app store. Obviously not many people actually do that, but it means google can't start pushing bad versions without a significant risk of getting caught.

November__ 8y ago

Water is wet

Strom 8y ago

There's no need for theoretical chat history leaks, there's already a practical one in place. Online WhatsApp backups aren't encrypted with end-to-end encryption. [1][2] WhatsApp keeps being "helpful" and aggressively suggests users turn on online chat backup, without mentioning on the same screen that this means your chat history will be uploaded without end-to-end encryption. The history is encrypted with a key that is sent to WhatsApp servers. This is used to provide a passwordless backup restore function even when you lose your phone. You contact WhatsApp with your mobile number and WhatsApp sends you back a code that is used to derive the key that was used to encrypt the backup which was sent to Apple/Google. All of this makes Zuckerberg's claims that law enforcement can't read the messages because Facebook can't pretty misleading. Law enforcement could get the backup from Apple/Google and the key from WhatsApp and have access to the whole chat history. There are apps already available to help you through this process. [3] -- [1] Media and messages you back up aren't protected by WhatsApp end-to-end encryption while in iCloud. https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/iphone/20888066/ https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/iphone/20888066/ [2] Media and messages you back up aren't protected by WhatsApp end-to-end encryption while in Google Drive. https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/android/20887921/ https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/android/20887921/ [3] Elcomsoft Explorer for WhatsApp 2.30 can now download and decrypt Android user’s encrypted WhatsApp communication histories https://blog.elcomsoft.com/2018/01/extract-and-decrypt-whatsapp-backups-from-google/ https://blog.elcomsoft.com/2018/01/extract-and-decrypt-whats...

stalf 8y ago
Even though I also find it very suspicious that WhatsApp keeps proactively badgering me about turning backup on, I don’t see how this could be exploited by Facebook as the messages are stored in iCloud and Google Drive which it can’t access.
- jononor 8y ago
  Whatapps needs a Google Drive API token to write that backup, don't they? If so, surely they can read it using the same token?
  - 8y ago

petters 8y ago

> it would take a good iOS developer just a few days to put in place code in both the Facebook and WhatsApp apps that could discretely copy this database from one app to the other, via their shared container. Weird article. If modifying the WhatsApp app is on the table, there are trivial ways to send decrypted messages elsewhere.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

sergioj97 8y ago

I think the encryption thing was more about Facebook not being able to intercept your messages, read/store them, and remain unnoticed. Of course they can "still" read your messages as they could rewrite the app in a few subtle ways to achieve that easily, but that's nothing new. I guess that if the app starts looking for the chats within the devices, it would be much easier to spot than it would if the messages were just analyzed as they went through WhatsApp's servers (so that's what the encryption is for).

sidcool 8y ago

Title is a bit misleading in my opinion. If you back up your chats to Google Drive, they obviously won't be E2E encrypted.

addedlovely 8y ago

Messages may be sent encrypted, but I bet they are analysed before being encrypted. Without an external independent audit I'm not sure I'd trust Zuck.

umairj 8y ago

I have also noticed seeing ads related to my voice calls and images shared over WhatsApp. Has anyone else noticed the same?

samblr 8y ago

Facebook treats our Whatsapp message content just like it's feed. Here is what happened few weeks ago : I exchanged whatsapp messages with a well known founder. Lo and behold - news about him and his startup are all over my facebook feed. Some which was published years ago. We live in echo chambers.

m-p-3 8y ago

End-to-end encryption like these shouldn't be considered private as long as no one else than yourself control the private key. It's not as convenient, but misplacing trust into corporation that has no interest in your privacy is dangerous.

discoball 8y ago

Common sense says that since FB owns WhatsApp no one should trust it. It's no different than if China owned WhatsApp. I mean WeChat. Just common sense.

throwaway648 8y ago

and os companies can install key loggers on your device/machine. and chipset manufacturers can backdoor the system. and so on. no piece of hardware or software is safe from evil deeds of people building them.