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WhatsApp Security is Broken by Design

Exploit allows anybody to see whether a WhatsApp user is online even if their status is set to private, proving how easy it is to break whatsapp security

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CIOL Bureau
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The popular mobile messaging app WhatsApp is in the news for the wrong reasons. A dutch developer, Maikel Zweerink has discovered a simple exploit in the app that allows anybody to check the online status of any user. This can be done even if a user has set his/her status message to ‘private’.

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The privacy settings can be bypassed by using a software called WhasSpy Public, which is a web-oriented application that tracks every move of anybody you’d like to follow.

According to Maikel’s blogpost, the software has been setup as a proof of concept to show that WhatsApp security is broken in terms of privacy. It can track change of profile pictures, privacy settings, and status changes, and displays them on a simple and easy to follow timeline. Moreover, it can be used to compare the status with that of another user.

With over half a billion users on WhatsApp worldwide according to a blogpost on WhatsApp site, the exploit is likely to gain a lot of popularity amongst hacking communities the world over. It opens up the doors for them to track any user. Moreover, the requirements for setting it up are not very stringent.

Hopefully, Facebook will close this exploit soon before somebody really mis-uses it!

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