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3 years ago, my friend, an Indian fact-checker, showed me a screenshot of a WhatsApp screen, showing warning from WhatsApp that a message contains a dangerous l

3 years ago, my friend, an Indian fact-checker, showed me a screenshot of a WhatsApp screen, showing warning from WhatsApp that a message contains a dangerous link This (the warning) is only possible if WhatsApp can read your messages I'm guessing that they read your message on the app. So their claim (end-to-end encryption) is indeed true and correct. But their app can and indeed has been reading your messages, for the past, at least, 3 years Which I personally don't mind, when it's done fully automatically (no humans involved) and only for this kind of uses (to warn users of dangers)

bonzini 6y ago
WhatsApp (the app) can obviously read the messages. It can hash the links and check them the same way that browsers do. It doesn't have to happen server-side.
- martinko 6y ago
  While true, you're being very generous.
  - bonzini 6y ago
    It's how Google's safe browsing API works, so it's not unlikely.
jannes 6y ago
Link previews are generated server-side, I think. The app sends a request to a Facebook API for every link that you send/receive. Usually this returns the little image + text snippet that you see in the app, but obviously this could also return a message that the link is considered dangerous. As a site owner you can probably see a request from a Facebook bot when a link to your site is shared on WhatsApp. (not sure how long they cache this)