By downloading and installing its APK on our Android phone we can access an entire communications ecosystem that covers both messages and calls, as well as sharing audio files, videos and images.Ī role model for Telegram and Google Allo.Īnd the most important thing is that it's really easy to use, as you only need a phone number to identify yourself, and very secure, as one of the latest updates to this service, now belonging to Facebook, has led to the implementation of end-to-end encryption for all our communications.
Thanks to the instant messaging application par excellence, we're connected to our friends and family 24 hours a day from our smartphone and we've already forgotten about outdated SMS and MMS.īut the functions of this multiplatform application (there are versions for PC and the web, and we can even synchronize it with our tablet or iPad) go beyond exchanging messages, despite being its initial purpose. Even so, users can also find in places like Google Play some fraudulent applications hiding under the appearance of a popular service or that simply requires more permissions than the strictly necessary.įor this reason, before downloading an application for the first time you should read carefully its rating and some comments from other users: if it is a trap that has evaded Google’s Play security, the previous experience of others can serve you as warning.Hardly any inventions end up making a big difference in our daily life. That way, both downloading and updating an application, the safest way to do it is going to the corresponding official site. When the user installs it and accepts all permissions requested, this false WhatsApp access the information stored on the users’ Android device. The web site does not promise any new features in the instant messaging service. It is the case of a website that distributes a malware designed to steal data and it does it under the official WhatsApp appearance. Without false advantages but just as fraudulent, these downloads will fill your device with malware or subscribe you to an SMS premium service at a great cost.
Furthermore, not only should be wary of those web pages that provide the so-called WhatsApp download with little credible characteristics: on other occasions, a platform which doesn’t belong to the official app nor to the corresponding applications market, will simply offer users to download WhatsApp as a way of attracting potential new victims. In this way, users can sort the Web woven by the crooks on the Internet.
That is why, the best way of avoiding any kind of fraud from making a hole in our pocket or someone stealing our information stored in our Android is using Google Play (or the App Store in case of having an Apple device) at the time of downloading and update or any other application. In general, the desire of enjoying new features on an application as common as WhatsApp makes some users to accept these updates even if they do not come from an official supplier.
The most recent case is the one of the so-called Blue WhatsApp, it promised changing the famous app’s green to blue, although this version hides a poisoned apple: a subscription to a premium service which will increase, quite a bit, the victims’ phone bill. Sometimes they create totally fake versions with presumed advantages as the possibility of customizing the app’s appearance. To generate this avalanche of fraudulent services, cybercriminals not only take advantage of WhatsApp’s latest features.
By doing so, it will not play any message, but actually it will download a malicious software on the user’s computer. Without going any further, WhatsApp voice calls lead on to fraud via email: the victim is notified by email of a pending voice message and in order to for hear it he just needs to click on it.
Each novelty announced by the instant messaging service is exploited immediately by the thugs on the network to deploy all kinds of social engineering techniques. The more famous an application is, the more likely it will be used by cybercriminals to carry out frauds, which may turn out very expensive for those distracted users. By becoming popular, they turn into a real danger.