The company also removed the forwarding shortcut button in a number of regions, too.ĭespite these interventions, early in the COVID-19 pandemic, WhatsApp was used to share misinformation about the virus. WhatsApp put limits on forwarding, so you can only forward to five groups, rather than the previous limit of 250. However, the company did implement a few changes. Digital misinformation is a difficult problem to deal with, but many viewed WhatsApp’s response to these events as apathetic. As this kind of misinformation was so easy to spread, business people in Brazil set up companies that created misinformation campaigns against candidates enabled by the fact that WhatsApp is used for both business and personal communication.īoth issues were ongoing through 2018, a year that was infamously terrible for Meta. In Brazil, WhatsApp was the primary source of fake news throughout the 2018 elections. These messages were widely shared across people’s networks and resulted in the lynching of those accused of these fake crimes. Messages containing details of fabricated child abductions were forwarded and spread across the platform, customized with local information. WhatsApp was implicated in the widespread violence that occurred in India during 20. Two of the most notable cases have been in India and Brazil. WhatsApp has also been subject to those same forces. Meta, in particular, has been condemned for its role in spreading misinformation throughout the 2020 US Presidential campaign. Social media companies have been criticized for allowing fake news and misinformation to spread on their platforms. However, remember that you won't be able to access your backups if you forget the password-WhatsApp can't restore it for you. You'll need to create a password to protect your backups. Go to Settings > Chats > Chat Backup > End-to-end Encrypted Backup and select Turn On to secure your WhatsApp backups. However, this setting is disabled by default. Thankfully, WhatsApp updated its service to include end-to-end encrypted chat backups. There are other means that attackers could use to gain access to your cloud storage accounts, too. As this file contains decrypted versions of all your messages, it is theoretically vulnerable and undermines WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption.Īs you have no choice in a backup location, you are at the mercy of the cloud providers to keep your data secure. The backup file stored on iCloud or Google Drive is not necessarily encrypted. These backups contain decrypted messages from your device. There is a local backup on your device in addition to a cloud-based backup. This is an essential feature as it allows you to recover accidentally deleted WhatsApp messages. WhatsApp allows you to back up your messages and media on Android (Google Drive) and iOS (iCloud). At the time, Facebook revealed the vulnerability affected all WhatsApp apps (including the business versions) across Android, iOS, Windows Phone, and Tizen OS. In some cases, hackers were able to install WhatsApp spyware due to a vulnerability, according to a security advisory published by the messaging service in 2019. If you are unfortunate enough to have downloaded one of these, the installation can distribute malware or otherwise compromise your computer. There have been instances of attackers passing off malicious software as WhatsApp desktop applications. That isn’t true of the wider internet.Ĭriminals, hackers, and scammers have all taken advantage of this. When you search for WhatsApp on those stores, it’s generally clear which app is the official one. The app stores on phones-the App Store on iOS and Google Play Store on Android-are more carefully regulated than the internet at large. WhatsApp’s enormous user base makes it an obvious target for cybercriminals, many of whom focus on WhatsApp Web and WhatsApp Desktop.
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