431–440 of 560 posts
Cell phones.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
And Australia has a law forcing its citizens, around the world, to code in backdoors.
The fact that both parties were on the same side of this argument just sickens me. Same with metadata retention. I vote thusly.
Israel doesn't even need Whatsapp to be installed. The IDF's Unit 8200[1] can probably hack most phones in Iran. And if not any of the private companies selling spyware software like the NSO Group[2 and 3]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_8200 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSO_Group [3] https://mepc.org/commentaries/israeli-cyber-companies-overvi...
I had a coworker from Iran and he said every single computer just runs the same cracked Windows XP version translated into Farsi. Easy to exploit
I'm surprised reading that the Iranian's regime concerns are centered on WhatsApp sharing information with Israel. It is much more likely that WhatsApp have 0-day vulnerabilities used by the Mossad to gain the info than WhatsApp actively sharing it.
> Iran banned WhatsApp and Google Play in 2022 during mass protests against the government So more than fearing Israel, they actually fear the public that has an encrypted communication channel that can't be tapped by their police. Explains a lot.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If the messages are managed on the two ends of the channel by a closed source binary that does who-knows-what. The meme/trope is that you can't possibly know what such an app does without the source. It just isn't true. There'd be no meaningful phone vulnerability research if it was.
You're assuming the vuln researcher has access to the backdoored binary. That's not necessarily the case. Imagine if they pushed an update of the app out with the vuln to only some users, or users in {country} in their app release configs
"Imagine an arbitrarily powerful adversary operating in arbitrarily narrow, undetectable ways" is not meaningful threat modeling beside being a kind of Universal Goalpost Moving technique. It is not a 'meme' that WhatsApp is e2e encrypted if that's the form and content of your objection. The other thing is still the meme!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think this is quite different than Iraq. We know Iran has many sites were they are developing nuclear technology, sites that they not only do they not let inspections happen, but that are literally buried deep in the ground. We also know they are acquiring or have acquired the technology to enrich to weapons grade, and they themselves have said they will continue to enrich beyond what a civilian program needs. In o…
If the intelligence community is not trust worthy, then upon what are you basing the claims in your post?
Common sense also needs to take into account that Iran already does have a working civilian reactor, and its fuel is supplied by Russia. Given the state of Iran's economy, there is no rational reason for it to be spending vast sums to build so many facilities simply to supply fuel to a reactor that is already supplied by someone else. They would be far better off spending their much needed resources building additional civilian reactors.
Is Iran close to producing an actual bomb ? Don't know. Is Iran investing huge sums to produce weapons grade nuclear material ? There is quite a lot of information to indicate that this is so, and there is only one reason to do this - to produce a nuclear bomb.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_facilities_in_Iran
Long list of nuclear sites, cross referenced from many diverse sources. Assume half is misinformation, there is a lot of evidence of a wide ranging program
https://isis-online.org/isis-reports/detail/analysis-of-iaea...
Analysis of the many IAEI reports. I am not sure of the reputation of the authors, but I have read through similar findings from different sources.
https://www.npr.org/2025/06/12/nx-s1-5431395/iran-nuclear-en...
"Iran isn't complying with its nuclear obligations for the first time in 20 years" from an IAEI report, reported by NPR
I find the wordsmithery on Meta's statement the most interesting: “We do not track your *PRECISE* location, we don’t keep logs of who everyone is messaging and we do not track the *PERSONAL* messages people are sending one another," it added. “We do not provide *BULK* information to any government.”
If you read around their points, it sounds like they track general location, log group messages, and provide specific information on request to a government.
When you use credit or debit cards your transactions and data related to it is collected and sold. When you apply for mortgages and close on a house all that information you put in there is collected and sold.
When you put your address in for the post office, when you apply for a drivers or fishing license... Your local governments collect that information and sell access to it.
Meta tries to then tie in your online and app/phone activity with your legal/financial identity it can obtain through partner data brokers.
This is Facebook's businesses model.
So, yes, this data is available to pretty much anybody that is willing to pay for it. Which includes governments.
None of this should be surprising to anybody at this point. Apple, Google, Microsoft, etc.. all of these companies will do this to greater or lesser extents nowadays since has worked out so well for Meta's bottom line.