An online privacy tool endorsed by former US National Security Agency (NSA) contractor and whistle-blower Edward Snowden is being used to protect WhatsApp messages from snooping by encrypting them.
Open Whisper Systems on Tuesday announced a partnership with Facebook-owned WhatsApp to use the TextSecure protocol to scramble messages in transit.
“WhatsApp deserves enormous praise for devoting considerable time and effort to this project,” Open Whisper Systems said in a blog post. “Even though we are still at the beginning of the rollout, we believe this already represents the largest deployment of end-to-end encrypted communication in history.”
Photo: AFP
WhatsApp confirmed the announcement, but declined to comment further.
TextSecure encryption enabled automatically as a default setting is already built into most recent version of WhatsApp for mobile devices powered by Google-backed Android software, with billions of messages being exchanged daily, Open Whisper said.
Open Whisper is an open-source project supported by donations and grants.
While taking part in a South By Southwest conference earlier this year, Snowden praised encryption tools offered by Open Whisper.
Snowden connected to the gathering remotely from Russia, where he took refuge after leaking information about widespread online surveillance by the NSA.
Facebook last month completed its purchase of WhatsApp, with the mostly stock deal tallying nearly US$22 billion.
On Tuesday, Facebook launched a mobile app for its Groups feature that lets users create and interact with communities on the site.
More than 700 million of Facebook’s 1.35 billion members use Groups, the company said.
The app is meant to make accessing Groups easier on a mobile device, the company said.
Additional reporting by AP
BIG BUCKS: Chairman Wei is expected to receive NT$34.12 million on a proposed NT$5 cash dividend plan, while the National Development Fund would get NT$8.27 billion Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday announced that its board of directors approved US$15.25 billion in capital appropriations for long-term expansion to meet growing demand. The funds are to be used for installing advanced technology and packaging capacity, expanding mature and specialty technology, and constructing fabs with facility systems, TSMC said in a statement. The board also approved a proposal to distribute a NT$5 cash dividend per share, based on first-quarter earnings per share of NT$13.94, it said. That surpasses the NT$4.50 dividend for the fourth quarter of last year. TSMC has said that while it is eager
‘IMMENSE SWAY’: The top 50 companies, based on market cap, shape everything from technology to consumer trends, advisory firm Visual Capitalist said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) was ranked the 10th-most valuable company globally this year, market information advisory firm Visual Capitalist said. TSMC sat on a market cap of about US$915 billion as of Monday last week, making it the 10th-most valuable company in the world and No. 1 in Asia, the publisher said in its “50 Most Valuable Companies in the World” list. Visual Capitalist described TSMC as the world’s largest dedicated semiconductor foundry operator that rolls out chips for major tech names such as US consumer electronics brand Apple Inc, and artificial intelligence (AI) chip designers Nvidia Corp and Advanced
Saudi Arabian Oil Co (Aramco), the Saudi state-owned oil giant, yesterday posted first-quarter profits of US$26 billion, down 4.6 percent from the prior year as falling global oil prices undermine the kingdom’s multitrillion-dollar development plans. Aramco had revenues of US$108.1 billion over the quarter, the company reported in a filing on Riyadh’s Tadawul stock exchange. The company saw US$107.2 billion in revenues and profits of US$27.2 billion for the same period last year. Saudi Arabia has promised to invest US$600 billion in the US over the course of US President Donald Trump’s second term. Trump, who is set to touch
SKEPTICAL: An economist said it is possible US and Chinese officials would walk away from the meeting saying talks were productive, without reducing tariffs at all US President Donald Trump hailed a “total reset” in US-China trade relations, ahead of a second day of talks yesterday between top officials from Washington and Beijing aimed at de-escalating trade tensions sparked by his aggressive tariff rollout. In a Truth Social post early yesterday, Trump praised the “very good” discussions and deemed them “a total reset negotiated in a friendly, but constructive, manner.” The second day of closed-door meetings between US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng (何立峰) were due to restart yesterday morning, said a person familiar
RSS