WhatsApp is working on a new feature for chat backup for both Google Drive and iCloud. By bringing this security feature called Password Protection, the security of the cloud backups will increase. The feature was in work from last year, and now the screenshots of it are presented for iOS and Android apps.
WhatsApp to Bring Password-Protected Feature for iCloud & Google Drive
WABetaInfo posted screenshots and revealed how the Password Protection feature will work. In the picture we can see, it reads as,
“To prevent unauthorized access to your iCloud Drive backup, you can set a password that will be used to encrypt future backups. This password will be required when you restore from the backup.”
As previously announced, @WhatsApp is working on cloud backups encryption.
The chat database and media will be safe from unauthorized access when using a password. The password is private and it's not sent to WhatsApp.
It will be available in a future build for iOS and Android. pic.twitter.com/Lp06PaECBX— WABetaInfo (@WABetaInfo) March 8, 2021
To protect the chat backup, the user needs to enter eight characters long password. And in the picture we can also see, it says, “WhatsApp will not be able to recover the forgotten passwords”. So, you need to make sure that you remember the password as you will not be able to reset it. Once the feature is officially out and you decide to encrypt the chats and media, do remember the password.
As of now, only this news is out, and no other official word or the reveal date of the feature is out. But it looks like the new Password protected feature will be soon out for both Android and iOS devices.
However, the WhatsApp chats are end-to-end encrypted, which means only sender and recipient can see those chats. The service says this protection does not extend to online backup stored on iCloud and Google Drive. Once, the backup is on this server, the security backup is then responsible to the cloud service providers.
These reports about the new security feature come out as WhatsApp’s reputation has hit a lot because of the new privacy policy. Even though, Whatsapp declares that the new policy will not affect the security of the user’s personal messages.
Apart from this, Whatsapp is going to bring some of the new features like add contacts via QR Code, disappearing messages, and more.