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| Facebook offers encrypted WhatsApp backup |
Facebook announced that it will provide end-to-end encrypted backups for WhatsApp for iOS and Android starting Thursday.
The company has provided end-to-end call encryption for many years. But with this new change, you get the same level of encryption as your backup.
This functionality will be gradually rolled out to users with the latest version of the app. The platform takes this step to virtually prevent private communications between individuals from being hacked through the app.
WhatsApp backups are stored in iCloud or Google Drive. However, this means that Apple or Google can hand the backup over to the government or law enforcement agencies if necessary.
With the changes introduced Thursday, you can protect your WhatsApp cloud backup with a 64-bit password or an encryption key, which in theory means only you can access the backup.
Neither WhatsApp nor the backup service provider can read the backups or access the keys required to unlock them.
"WhatsApp is based on the simple idea that what you share with your friends and family stays with you," Facebook said. Five years ago, we added end-to-end encryption as a standard, protecting more than 100 billion messages per day as they travel between more than two billion users.
While the end-to-end encrypted messages you send and receive are stored on your device, many people also want a way to save their conversations in case they lose their phone. Starting today, we're offering an optional extra level of security to protect backups stored via iCloud or Google Drive with end-to-end encryption.
Facebook provides extra security for your backups
The company is proud that no other global messaging service of this scale can offer this level of security for user messages, media, voice mail, video calls, and chat backups.
Users of this platform can see the option to generate a 64-bit encryption key to lock chat backups in the cloud. Users can store encryption keys offline or in a password manager of their choice. Or they can create a password and store their encryption key in a cloud-based backup key store developed by the company.
If there is no user password, the encryption key stored in the cloud cannot be used. "We know that some people prefer 64-bit encryption keys," WhatsApp said. Others want something they can easily remember. So we include these two options.
After creating an encrypted backup, the previous version of the backup will be deleted. This happens automatically and the user does not need any action.