News + Trends
CES Privacy Keynote: Facebook, Apple, Procter & Gamble and the government do the honours
by Dominik Bärlocher
WhatsApp, encryption and fake news: the challenge of encrypted messaging
8.4.2020
Translation: machine translated
WhatsApp wants to put an end to the spread of fake news. The problem is that the messaging app's encryption does not allow its parent company, Facebook, to read your messages.
Chains on WhatsApp are annoying. One person learned from another that a colleague of his sister had received a message on his iPhone sent by federal agents in Bern. When he clicked on it: all the data disappeared! Big shock.
WhatsApp's parent company, Facebook, wants to put a stop to this. The problem: WhatsApp and Facebook can't read your messages. Facebook would therefore like to limit the number of transfers possible at one time, reports trade magazine MobileWorldLive.
Encryption vs. content control
WhatsApp messaging is end-to-end encrypted. The encryption comes from the company that also created Signal and does not allow Facebook to view your messages. The reasons for this are noble and it's the only right decision for a messaging app. Facebook doesn't want to open the door to censorship and surveillance. That's what Erin Egan, head of privacy at Facebook, said at CES in Las Vegas.
Encryption is ideal, but it can be misused. The spread of fake news is just one sad example. Unverified or falsified information can be disseminated undetected and without any sanctioning authority being able to intervene. The providers of the messaging app simply don't have the means to do anything about it.
Without encryption, everything would be simpler: if a fake message about Bernese federal agents were circulating, Facebook could either automatically stop the forwarding of messages containing the words "Bernese federal agents", or accompany the message with a warning that the message is probably fake.
A censorship of messages by Facebook, i.e. it would not be forwarded, would be simply unacceptable. After all, if the "Bernese federal agents" are censored without notifying users, how do we know whether the firm is censoring other messages and which ones?
For Facebook to censor messages without notifying users, it would be unacceptable.
In the case of a warning accompanying the message, the situation would be more acceptable, but there is still scope for abuse.
The current situation of not allowing Facebook to interfere with messaging traffic is therefore entirely reasonable. It does, however, make the message forwarding limit a little fuzzy, since you can still forward fake messages to a large number of people. Facebook cannot, after all, remove the mass forwarding function.
Personal responsibility and media competence required
The first line of defence against fake news, and by far the most powerful, is not some attempt at censorship or warning from Facebook. No, the best weapon is you. All you have to do is ask yourself a few questions and think for a few moments between reading and forwarding the message.
Fake news is generally easy to detect.
- They often come from strange sources you've never heard of, or have a URL that doesn't match the layout.
- What other articles are published on the page from which the incredible info you read originated? Do the articles have headlines like "Federal Bern imports Islamist terrorism", or do the articles end with doubt-sowing phrases like "Hmmm.... If so, you can ignore the news without asking further questions.
- What are the sources? Are they all anonymous sources, 'insiders' or 'experts'? If names are quoted: are they realistic, does the person really exist? No one can have seven doctorates and 16 registered patents at the age of 25.
- Did other news portals more widely recognised as such and accepted relay the info? Take a moment to check on FactCheck or Snopes whether other media are also reporting it. In Switzerland, you still have to do a bit of manual research work, but know that the newspapers 20 Minuten and Watson are credible media outlets in the context of the Swiss media.
- Use your judgement. Shocking news doesn't surface overnight. So in the case of the federal agents in Bern, they certainly wouldn't be new. You would have already heard about them if they existed.
- When something seems so shocking that your heart almost stops, the rule is that it's too big to be true. Especially if the info only comes from one source. Big news is usually relayed by the mainstream media at breakneck speed and spreads like wildfire.
- An employee's colleague's sister, who is cousins with an acquaintance or anyone else is not going to be the first person to relay a piece of news on a global scale. Whistleblowers speak directly to the media and do not share their explosive discoveries via WhatsApp to their acquaintances.
Good. I've finished. P.S. there is no such thing as "Bernese federal agents".
Journalist. Author. Hacker. A storyteller searching for boundaries, secrets and taboos – putting the world to paper. Not because I can but because I can’t not.
Smartphone
Follow topics and stay updated on your areas of interest
34 comments
later