Re:There is no WhatsApp 'backdoor'
by rndgermandude on Friday January 13, 2017 @08:01PM
(#13396158)
Indeed. I'm working under the assumption that the client itself is sound.
The question is: how many users will actually check the Security Number, and recheck all the security numbers now that they were made aware of having to turn on the notification.
What WhatsApp is doing here is like using a self signed certificate to do TLS (your own fault if you did not check the cert yourself using whatever out-of-bands method available) and on top of that the TLS client later by default will not tell you when that self-signed cert changes (and you therefore need to recheck it) and for added bonus routing all traffic through them.
The question is: how many users will actually check the Security Number, and recheck all the security numbers now that they were made aware of having to turn on the notification.
What WhatsApp is doing here is like using a self signed certificate to do TLS (your own fault if you did not check the cert yourself using whatever out-of-bands method available) and on top of that the TLS client later by default will not tell you when that self-signed cert changes (and you therefore need to recheck it) and for added bonus routing all traffic through them.