{"id":113,"date":"2020-02-17T20:18:37","date_gmt":"2020-02-17T20:18:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/?p=113"},"modified":"2020-02-17T20:18:38","modified_gmt":"2020-02-17T20:18:38","slug":"telegram-founder-says-whatsapp-contains-numerous-backdoors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/telegram-founder-says-whatsapp-contains-numerous-backdoors\/","title":{"rendered":"Telegram Founder says WhatsApp Contains Numerous Backdoors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>WhatsApp has been in the news a lot lately \u2013 especially since it was discovered that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman utilized WhatsApp to <a href=\"https:\/\/torguard.net\/blog\/is-nso-malware-being-used-to-target-us-companies\/\">hack Amazon founder Jeff Bezos\u2019s phone<\/a>. This highly publicized hack has brought the security of WhatsApp into the current conversation, with many security experts and competing messaging services weighing in on recent events. Telegram founder Pavel Durov has a lot to say on the matter, and he seems to be onto something. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>WhatsApp\nUsers Have Been In Trouble Before<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While the Bezos and Bin Salman incident was highly\npublicized, it\u2019s certainly not the first of its kind. While both people\ninvolved in this particular incident are among the highest of high profile\nindividuals, scams and hacks take place via WhatsApp to regular folks on a\nregular basis. Scammers and phishers have used WhatsApp to extort money from\nusers or collect passwords from them under the guise of anonymity. WhatsApp has\nmade numerous false promises regarding privacy improvements and encryption, but\nnone of them have come to pass. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Telegram\nFounder\u2019s Thoughts and Feelings<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Pavel Durov, Telegram\u2019s founder, has been vocally opposing\nand criticizing WhatsApp for quite some time \u2013 even more so since the major\nincident. As the founder of a chat app, Durov is familiar with security\npractices and the purpose (or dangers) of backdoors. WhatsApp is owned by\nFacebook, and in the wake of recent discoveries, Facebook has decided to blame\niOS for the flaw responsible for allowing the hack to play out on Bezos\u2019s iPhone.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Durov isn\u2019t here for any of it. He claims that Facebook is\nwrongfully forcing blame onto another company in an attempt to escape\ncountability. Durov feels that Facebook needs to step up and own some of the\nfundamental flaws with the app. He shifts the blame right back to WhatsApp,\nclaiming that chat backups on iCloud are the problem. By using their own\ninfrastructure, WhatsApp can provide more secure storage of messages. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Durov has also criticized the fact that WhatsApp\u2019s source\ncode is not available to the public. Making this code available would give\nusers and developers a better idea of the kind of encryption utilized by\nWhatsApp, allowing professionals to better assess its suitability and\nefficiency. Durov seems to imply that by hiding the source code (and it\u2019s worth\nnoting that Telegram\u2019s is available), the messaging service may also be hiding\nmore glaring issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The\nPlacement of the Backdoors<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Durov\u2019s experience as a chat app owner has taught him many\nthings. He blames the security issues on deliberately placed backdoors. It\u2019s\nnot unusual for law enforcement agencies to request backdoors or special\naccess, specifically as it pertains to solving crimes. In some countries with\nheavy internet censorship, such as Russia and Iran, these backdoors are a prerequisite\nfor an app to be sold. Failure to comply will remove the app from the local\nmarket.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Durov refused to comply, making Telegram inaccessible in\ncertain countries. Since WhatsApp is available across most of the globe, it\ngoes without saying that they complied with requests from these governments.\nThese backdoors in and of themselves are security flaws that can make the app\nmore vulnerable \u2013 if governments can use them, so can hackers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>How to\nKeep Your Communications Secure<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Heavily encrypted messaging without any backdoors is hard to\ncome by. PrivateMail is proud to offer exactly that. OpenPGP encrypted emails\nand paranoid encrypted cloud service for attachments means that no one except\nthe sender and the recipient will ever be aware of the content being sent or\nreceived. If you\u2019re looking to avoid security flaws in your messaging, we\u2019re\neverything you need. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WhatsApp has been in the news a lot lately \u2013 especially since it was discovered that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman utilized WhatsApp to hack Amazon founder Jeff Bezos\u2019s phone. This highly publicized hack has brought the security of WhatsApp into the current conversation, with many security experts and competing messaging services weighing in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":114,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,2],"tags":[39],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":115,"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113\/revisions\/115"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/privatemail.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}