WhatsApp Turns ON End-to-End Encryption for ALL

WhatsApp is updating its messaging app so that every text message and voice call will be encrypted for the company’s one billion users.

Yes, Whatsapp has finally implemented full end-to-end encryption, as promised a year ago.

This means, from now every message, image or voice call you made will be secured by end-to-end encryption so that only you and the person you're communicating with can read the content of the message, and nobody in between, not even WhatsApp.

In other words, this also means that WhatsApp would not be able to comply with any court order that demands access to the content of any conversation happens over its service.

Starting today, you will see a notification on your WhatsApp conversation screen as your messenger becomes end-to-end encrypted, as shown in the screenshot.

"Message you send to this chat and calls are now secured with end-to-end encryption. Tap for more info." 

"This is because your messages are secured with a lock, and only the recipient and you have the special key needed to unlock and read them," Whatsapp says.

Additionally, you will be able to see a small lock icon below the profile of the recipient that ensures your conversation is secured with encryption.

"All of this happens automatically: no need to turn on settings or set up special secret chats to secure your messages," the company adds.

How to verify if someone is trying to spy on your conversation?

Well,  the latest version of WhatsApp mobile application offers you an option to verify the keys of the other users with whom you are communicating, ensuring prevention from the man-in-the-middle attack.

Whatsapp key verification can be done by scanning a QR code, or by comparing a 60-digit number, under newly introduced "verify security code" option in the WhatsApp.

"WhatsApp users can opt in to a preference which notifies them every time the security code for a contact changes."

About a year ago, Facebook partnered with ‘Open Whisper System’, company behind the popular Signal and TextSecure encryption apps, to integrate the Signal's Open source strong encryption protocol into WhatsApp messaging app.

Important Note — However, there is one point to be noted that if several users are sending texts in a group chat and one of the users is running an older version of WhatsApp that doesn’t support encrypted messages, all the conversation going through that group chat will remain unencrypted.

ADOBE'S RELEASES EMERGENCY SECURITY UPDATE- PATCH NOW.!!

The Adobe Flash Player just said goodbye to the year with another bunch of vulnerability patches.

Adobe released an out-of-band security update on Monday to address Nineteen (19) vulnerabilities in its Flash Player, including one (CVE-2015-8651) that is being exploited in the wild.

All the programming loopholes could be abused to execute malicious code (here malicious Flash file on a web page) on victims' computers in order to hijack an unpatched PC or Mac entirely.

So, if you are running the Flash Player plugin on Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, or Chrome OS, it is time for you to upgrade your system as soon as possible before criminals start taking advantage of the bugs.

Here're the details of the Flash's 19 security vulnerabilities patched in the emergency APSB16-01 updateposted Monday afternoon:

• A Type Confusion Vulnerability that could lead to arbitrary code execution (CVE-2015-8644)
• An Integer Overflow Vulnerability that also leads to code execution (CVE-2015-8651)
• Use-After-Free() Vulnerabilities that could also lead to code execution
• Memory Corruption Vulnerabilities that could also lead to code execution

The company did not provide many details about the attacks exploiting the Integer Overflow Vulnerability (CVE-2015-8651) discovered by Huawei, other than describing them as "limited, targeted attacks."

Upgrade your machines to the following patched versions of Flash Player:

• Flash Player versions 20.0.0.267 and 18.0.0.324 for Windows and Mac users.
• Flash Player version 20.0.0.267 for Google Chrome
• Flash Player version 20.0.0.267 for Microsoft Edge and Internet Explorer 11 on Windows 10
• Flash Player version 20.0.0.267 for IE 10 and 11 on Windows 8.x
• Flash Player version 11.2.202.559 for Linux

You can also get the latest Flash Player versions from Adobe's website.

However, if you really want to get rid of these nasty bugs, you are advised to simply disable or completely uninstall Adobe Flash Player immediately.

Flash has plagued with several stability and security issues, which is why developers had hated the technology for years.

Moreover, this is the reason Adobe plans to kill Flash Player and re-brands it as Adobe Animate CC — Adobe's Premier Web animation tool for developing HTML5 content.