WhatsApp Introduces Three New Security Features To Protect And Secure User Accounts

WhatsApp already offers End-To-End Encryption to prevent any third party from listening to or watching conversations. Moving forward, the instant messaging platform will thwart device-swap or device-cloning attacks.

A trio of new features will be gradually offered to WhatsApp users. The Meta-owned internet-based instant messaging platform is increasing the security of the platform and these features won't need any user intervention to activate as some of the work will happen at the backend.

WhatsApp Introduces Account Protect And Device Verification Features

WhatsApp has introduced Account Protect, a feature that adds an additional verification step for users when they switch their WhatsApp account to a new device.

WhatsApp will ask for confirmation about the transition to a new device on the old device. The platform claims this step is to verify that the user actually wants to transfer the account to a new device, which is an extra security check.

From a security perspective, the Account Protect feature will alert users about any unauthorized attempt to move their WhatsApp account to another device.

The Device Verification feature will help authenticate a user account and protect it if the user's device is compromised. This helps prevent mobile device malware from taking advantage of a lost or stolen phone without the user's permission and using their WhatsApp account to send unwanted messages.

The new feature will also try and prevent any attempts to hijack or steal a WhatsApp account using traditional Take Over (ATO) attacks. Device Verification automatically blocks an attacker's connection, while allowing the victim to use their WhatsApp account uninterrupted.

WhatsApp Gets Automatic Security Codes To Verify Users And Ensure Secure Connection

WhatsApp users have been able to use the Security Code Verification feature to ensure they are chatting with the intended recipient. Moving forward, this feature will be based on a process called "Key Transparency".

WhatsApp claims Key Transparency will "help strengthen the guarantee that end-to-end encryption provides to private, personal messaging applications in a transparent manner available to all."

WhatsApp has even published an open-source library, dubbed the Auditable Key Directory (AKD). Using this library, users will be able to verify audit proofs of the directory's correctness.

The above-mentioned features will be gradually offered to WhatsApp users in the near future, and do not need any action from users. However, WhatsApp offers two additional security features, which do need user intervention. WhatsApp has reminded users to activate the Two-Step Verification and End-To-End Encrypted backups.