Reaction Share After controversy over new terms and conditions that were forced to be delayed until May, cyber security expert Forbes magazine says they should act as a “severe alert” to Facebook Messenger’s 1.3 billion users.

“Yes, Messenger data collection is significantly more dangerous than that Share“Jack Toffman, Managing Director of Digital Barriers, mentions in an article published in the American media on January 16, 2021, where he explains why you should drop Facebook Messenger.

“We all know that Facebook is leaving our data, this is what we pay for their free services. But there must be a limit. If we find ourselves in a situation where Facebook says ‘I will do everything I can’, we accept that it is about us and our own privacy. What’s so significant about a goat ‘? “

According to a review, WhatsApp failure, which has caused thousands of users to migrate to Signal or Telegram these days due to an unfortunate series of events (poorly managed public relations and very poor communication), is an invasion of privacy used by Facebook Messenger.

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One of WhatsApp’s main protections when discussing its privacy policies is that it cannot view private messages. But if you are a Messenger user, beware, you are not so lucky.

“Facebook acknowledges that it monitors content sent to users in private messages. Facebook makes all of its metadata unquestionable, another claim that WhatsApp has questioned by its own users and metadata,” he said in his article.

Internet security analysts Tommy Misk and Talal Hajj Bakr came to light a year ago as a perfect example of Facebook Messenger’s lack of respect for privacy as the app “downloads personal links sent between users to its own servers”. As well as links to shared files and websites. The messenger’s problem with accessing your personal information is easily solved, and that’s the ultimate first-to-last encryption, ”says Doffman, indicating that absence is not an option.

Unlike WhatsApp, end-to-end encryption in Messenger only supports private messages between two people, not within groups, which is not enabled by default. If the option is selected, Facebook will stop searching for messages and downloading links and links.

“The lack of final encryption for this decision makes the messenger useless to me. It should be the default for any news site you use. Facebook itself has warned of the dangers posed by the lack of this type of encryption, and WhatsApp deserves better recognition for having global access, making the final first final code available to 2 billion users , ”Says Toffman.

According to the expert, the final encryption should not be taken for granted: a great advantage is that we can send and receive calls from anywhere in the world safe from government network surveys and bad actors. “One of the paradoxes of WhatsApp’s reaction is that users exit this app by default encrypted telegram, which it doesn’t,” he says.

This, in turn, re-focuses on Facebook’s practices, which he considers users to switch to another alternative. In 2019, “Mark Zuckerberg argued that private messaging would become the new norm, transforming the social need to share everything everywhere. Following the first reports of Facebook’s plans to integrate WhatsApp with Messenger and Instagram DMs, it created a news agency that will serve nearly 3 billion users. “

Enables “Dark Mode” in Facebook Messenger

At that time, news came that Messenger would be encrypted from end to end, which was a huge improvement. “But after two years, we have not seen any definite improvement. The blocking of confidential conversations, missing messages and some beta WhatsApp code represent a news portal in development. However, starting with Messenger and Instagram, we have seen the beginning of that integration, with no security improvements in sight, ”he says.

He noted last year that Facebook “is very committed to encrypting Messenger from end to end”. In fact, Jay Sullivan of Facebook promised the Senate committee in 2019 that “people can communicate with their friends and loved ones safely and privately without anyone, including Facebook, listening to or monitoring their conversations.”

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He added that users can submit medical and financial information “in the hope that it will not fall into the hands of identity thieves or malicious intent.” But, the expert warns, Messenger monitors content, and “health and fitness”, “vital information” and “financial information” are among the user data fields that it agrees to collect through its Messenger site.

Adding encryption from the end would have been a saving grace for Messenger because it would not protect the metadata but prevent the content from being tracked, stored and processed. “But WhatsApp’s reaction has made millions of people realize that content encryption is not enough.”

Tofman says, “Everyone now knows that Facebook’s data practices are not buried in the best axis of privacy policy. We can all see the absurd difference between Messenger and other sites, however we still do not understand how that metadata is monetized and used to target ads. “

Expert advises: “If you’re still on Messenger or you’re using Instagram direct messages for anything other than shopping business or casual contact, now is the time to switch. Your easy option is yet to give WhatsApp its size – all your friends and family are potential users. For the safest option, run the signal in parallel. This can be very useful when adding more contacts. ”

The signal messaging app is one of the main downloads on the Apple Store and Google Play platforms in many countries, with WhatsApp asking its closest two billion users on January 7, 2021 to accept the new terms that allow it. Share more information with Facebook. Photo / AFP

It said, “As WhatsApp and Signal run in parallel, you will be protected in terms of security and privacy. Over time, he says, it will use the signal as the default option, but for that, all your communications must use it. ”

It ends by recommending to users, “Move all your chats and groups from Facebook Messenger to WhatsApp or Signal.

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