A new bug has been detected in the popular social networking app Whatsapp, which will enable third parties to stalk users. The bug has been confirmed by security researchers as well.
Read on to find out all the details about this bug in WhatsApp!
New Bug Found In WhatsApp; Third Parties Can Now Stalk And Find Out Location Of Victims
This issue has been found to exist through the online status feature of WhatsApp which is available by default.
There is a whole bunch of android and iPhone apps and Web services that will exploit this online status feature and allow third parties to track individuals without their consent. Such tracking solutions are used by cyberstalkers and keep an eye on the users of the app.
A blog has been published by a cybersecurity firm Traced that has discovered apps and services which might be used by cyberstalkers when a user becomes active on WhatsApp. The company has explained that if a mobile number is entered and if the person uses WhatsApp the status tracker will provide the exact date and time at which the user has opened WhatsApp.
This bug will allow online trackers only to see when the users are active and do not allow them to look at their messages or any other online activity.
How Does The Bug Work?
As per reports, Traced has detected that many of these cyberstalkers sell themselves as a solution to help people know when their contacts come online on Whatsapp. This could be used by cyberstalkers to monitor others.
Additionally, it has also been found that some WhatsApp online status trackers enable users to enter the phone numbers of two individuals. This lets cyberstalkers know that whether the two users are chatting with each other on the app at a particular time.
Cyberstalking apps aren’t allowed to be published on the play store by Google. However, whatsapp online tracking apps on Google play pretend as solutions for parents and spouses so that they will know when their family and friends are online on WhatsApp.
Whatsapp has reportedly designed its online status feature that is probably the way through which third parties are cyberstalking their victims.
WhatsApp’s reply to this bug was:
“We provide a setting to allow people to choose who can view the time a user was ‘last seen’ within WhatsApp. To help prevent abuse, we regularly work with app stores to seek the removal of apps that attempt to violate our terms of service. We have banned the WhatsApp accounts associated with such websites, requested Google remove such apps from the Play Store, and also take legal action, as appropriate. Automating WhatsApp’s features to scrape information is a violation of our terms of service and we will continue to take action to protect the privacy of our users and help prevent abuse.”
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