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Is WhatsApp bad for privacy?
(lemm.ee)
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this post was submitted on 23 Oct 2023
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Privacy
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If you log into WhatsApp on another device, does your history show up?
If it does, that means they hold your encryption keys on their server. It's the only way this could work.
It's why with Signal you need to maintain your keys and keep backups. No one else has your keys, so logging in to other devices won't get history without that backup and the keys.
Works this way with encrypted XMPP too, of course.
You have to scan a QR code from the website with your phone, which I'm assuming then facilitates a transfer of the keys.
That's essentially what's been posited by this rando on StackExchange.
https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/119552/how-does-end-to-end-encryption-work-with-whatsapp-web
Does it work if your other devices are offline? That would be telling.