The Middle East region – as the West calls it – was known as a battlefield that brought together the neighboring countries with the Zionist entity for decades, but the last war is not like the rest of the wars, as everyone was surprised by the ability of Israel to determine the positions of prominent figures and target them and achieve direct injuries.
In the past two weeks, Israel has announced the targeting of Iran’s most prominent scholars and leaders in an operation called “the rising lion”, which was astonished by this exceptional ability to collect information and accurately target the victims, and this raised a question for everyone – how did Israel manage its goals accurately despite the intense protection of these personalities? The answer lies in the technology you use.
It seems that Iran has accused the WhatsApp application of the American company Meta, where she said, that the application was leaked sensitive data on its users to the Israeli intelligence services, and indicated that this breach of privacy may have helped Israel implement air strikes that killed many senior Iranian military officials and nuclear scientists.
Iran urged its citizens on official television to delete the WhatsApp application from their smartphones immediately, claiming that the American application collects user information and then sends it to Israel.
For its part, Mita denounced this speech claiming that the application uses the technology of complete encryption between the two parties, noting that even the provider of the service cannot read the messages, and she stated, “We do not follow the sites of users accurately and do not keep their messages records and do not follow the personal messages that users send, and also we do not give any information to any government agency.”
Despite dead allegations of the cleanliness of its application, the US House of Representatives announced a ban on WhatsApp use on all devices for the council, after security concerns related to the application and the mechanism of encrypting its data.
Based on these developments, WhatsApp prohibiting as an unsafe application is the only thing that the United States and Iran agreed together.
“Five Eyes” efforts to open a rear door in WhatsApp
The “Five Eye” coalition is known as one of the strongest and oldest intelligence alliances in the world and includes the United States, Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, and in July 2019, British and American intelligence agencies and other English -speaking countries concluded a two -day meeting in London, amid calls to grant security authorities, such as police and intelligence services special powers to access encrypted messages on the application WhatsApp via a back door.
Officials said that one of the most prominent topics discussed in the meeting was how to deal with the challenges imposed by modern encryption techniques, especially in light of the technology companies seeking to enhance the safety of their services after being exposed to a series of security breaches.
However, the meetings were held secretly, and their agenda was not announced, which makes it difficult to know the fine details of what the ministers, officials and participating intelligence agencies discussed.
It is not surprising that the Five Eye Alliance is cooperating with Israel. In January 2024, Israel assassinated the vice president of Hamas and the leader of the movement in the West Bank, Saleh Al -Arouri, based on intelligence information issued by the Pine Gap facility, which is located in Australia.
It is noteworthy that the “Payne Gab” facility is a partnership between the United States and Australia, which is a very important complex in the global monitoring network “The Five”, where the main data is collected by a group of satellites that include 40 satellites dedicated to espionage.
What is WhatsApp is a threat to American national security?
The US House of Representatives issued a decision prohibiting the use of WhatsApp, as he sent a memorandum to all members and employees confirming the prohibition of this application due to security risks, and this includes the absence of transparency regarding the protection of user data and the lack of encryption of the stored data, which results in many security gaps.
This decision came due to five basic concerns that may result from WhatsApp use of the official works of the White House, especially for talks related to national security, and these concerns include the following:
Descriptive data
Descriptive data is information that the wireless telecom companies collect about the place, time and identity of those who make their phone calls without including any records of the same call.
Although WhatsApp claims that the user talks are encrypted with complete encryption technology between the two parties, but it collects the descriptive data of the conversations, and WhatsApp explains that what it collects in its privacy policy, it classifies the information that collects it into 3 categories: the information provided by the user and the information that collects automatically and the information provided by external parties.
Information provided by the user account information, such as communication messages such as customer support information that collects automatically, use and registry information, transactions information, device information and communication, cookies, status information, external parties information, information provided by others about you, service providers from external parties, third -party services.
It is clear that WhatsApp collects information about its users, which may provide a deeper understanding of politics and communications and participants in the talks and even geographical location data.
Some of these data can be classified as a descriptive, while others are just data -but they are valuable data with this, and the National Security Agency “NSA” has built a full intelligence process on descriptive data.
WhatsApp legal agreement
Many users do not see the terms of the WhatsApp agreement, but the White House does this as a confirmation, as it was stated in one of the items, “We have the right to appoint our rights and our obligations contained in our free conditions for any of our companies or that are related to us through incorporation, acquisitions, restructuring or selling assets or under the law or others, and we are also entitled to transfer your information to any companies affiliated with us or later entities for us or a new owner. The waiver, our conditions remain the ruling on your relationship with these third parties. “
This item allows WhatsApp, not only the collection of descriptive data, but also to distribute it according to the necessity or according to what the law requires, and these laws may differ in China or the European Union, and this also highlights the fact that the descriptive data collected is not limited to a data center in Santa Clara, but where WhatsApp has decided to copy that data to anywhere in the world.
Just as there is another clause that, “our services may allow you to access, use, or interact with web sites, applications, content, products and other services belonging to a third party.
For example, you may choose to use the data backup services provided by third parties, such as Claude and Google Drive, which are integrated with our services, or use the reaction through a sharing button on a third party web, which allows you to send information to your contacts on WhatsApp.
This item opens the door wide to the terms and conditions of external parties, in addition to the ability to copy data to other applications, but can WhatsApp talks be copied backup to external services without encryption? Perhaps US House officials know the answer.
Using screen and email clips
One of the problems that has emerged from the use of personal devices and applications, such as WhatsApp in government work, is that they may violate important American laws, such as the Federal Record Law and the Law of Protection of Secret Documents, and these laws require officials to save all official communications safely and organized.
According to the “CNN” report, Jared Kushner, a former adviser to the President of the United States, was taking screenshots of the talks from WhatsApp, and sending them to his email at the White House to abide by these laws, which raised the concerns of cybersecurity experts.
When taking a screenshot on the phone, it is automatically kept in the pictures, which are often on “Cloud” or Google’s photos, was Kushner used Claud? Or Google? Where are that data now? Are you still safe?
On the other hand, no one knows if Kushner was using a strong encryption when sending these images from his phone to his governmental mail, and if he did not use a strong encryption, he actually canceled the security protection provided by WhatsApp, and sent sensitive information via the Internet without encryption.
Baccolopia penetration
If someone wants to penetrate the WhatsApp account for a senior official, it often will not attack WhatsApp because it depends on complete encryption, and this makes it difficult for the task, but it may target the phone itself and then control WhatsApp.
The seriousness of this step is the possibility of sending malicious software or misleading instructions to prominent people, which may cause a disaster that negatively reflects national security.
The real weakness of humans
It is normal for government employees like foreign ministers to use their personal phones and easy applications such as WhatsApp, because they are simply more comfortable and speed than complex official systems such as “Linux”, and from here the term “Shadow IT”, which means the use of employees as tools without approval or knowledge of the IT department.
But the ease of use does not mean safety, and does not mean that this behavior is acceptable, for example, in other areas such as financing, the regulatory authorities are strictly prohibited to send any messages through immediate applications to prevent fraud. Is it logical not to apply the same standards to those who manage state affairs?
The biggest challenge in cybersecurity is the human factor, no matter how developing systems develop, man remains the weakest link, as one penetration is enough for a catastrophe.
Even if WhatsApp is serious in protecting privacy, it is ultimately a company, which is run by human beings who have a broad access to data, and one individual’s mistake is sufficient for a disaster at the level of national security.