As the government continues to call for traceability of WhatsApp messages to combat fake news, the National Security Advisory Board (NSAB) appears to have devised a workaround to the problem.
As per a report by The Economic Times, “The body which happens to be the security advisor for the Prime Minister’s office (PMO) has reached out to WhatsApp to help them fulfil the Indian government’s demand for traceability of messages without disrupting its encryption feature.”
Speaking to the publication, IIT Madras professor and a fellow member of the NSAB, V Kamakoti explained the solution using which WhatsApp will be able to provide the phone number of the sender of a message.
He explained: “the creator of the message first sends it to his contact(s), these contact(s) will know who the author is. If the author of a message has no objection to these contact( s) forwarding the message to others, then there is no issue with what is proposed. If the author has an objection and yet the receiver forwards it, then it is a breach of privacy between the two parties. If the author wants that the message should not be forwarded by the recipients, then he/she can be provided an option to choose between “forward-able/not forwardable” at the time of creation of the message.
In addition, “suppose the author wants that the message should not be forwarded by the recipients, then he/she can be provided an option to choose between “forward-able/not forward-able” at the time of creation of the message. This needs only one bit — a fraction of a byte — to be added to the message, which does not allow the receiver to forward it further.”