WhatsApp failed to exclude invitation links to group chats from Google search, resulting in 400,000 group chats being listed on Google.
Links to hundreds of thousands of WhatsApp group chats on Google search public! – The most important thing at the beginning:
WhatsApp has failed to exclude from Google search the links that can be sent to invite people to group chats. Google was able to find over 400,000 group chats with which you can join other people's groups. The problem is now partially resolved.
WhatsApp has long made it possible to invite users to a group chat via a link. If you follow this link, you will automatically be added to the corresponding group.
The Verge reports that until recently, thousands of these invitation links could be found publicly via Google.
Joining other groups possible
Journalist Jordan Wildon was probably the first to draw attention to this problem. He wrote on Twitter: “WhatsApp groups are not as secure as users think.”
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He noticed that the URLs used to add people to WhatsApp group chats were indexed by Google and listed in searches. One click on such a link is enough to join another group. And once you're in such a chat, all of the participants' phone numbers are visible.
Your WhatsApp groups may not be as secure as you think they are.
The “Invite to Group via Link” feature allows groups to be indexed by Google and they are generally available across the internet. With some wildcard search terms you can easily find some… interesting… groups. pic.twitter.com/hbDlyN6g3q
— Jordan Wildon (@JordanWildon) February 21, 2020
Over 400,000 Whatsapp group chats found
Motherboard looked into the issue and entered “site:chat.whatsapp.com” into the Google search. This is the beginning of the URL that all WhatsApp invitation links begin with. Motherboard was able to find over 400,000 chats.
Most WhatsApp groups were chats where porn videos were shared. A group that, according to their description, served as a discussion space for NGOs was also found. According to Jordan Wilson, a group of right-wing extremists was also found.
Facebook was already aware of the problem
Twitter user Viji commented on Twitter that he had already pointed out the error to Facebook in November. He added Facebook's reaction as a screenshot.
It seems Facebook acknowledged this after @hackrzvijay alerted them, suggesting that admins can invalidate the link.
In the app, I could only generate a new link (which invalidates the old one), but couldn't disable it altogether. https://t.co/AlPtuRxjbN
— Jordan Wildon (@JordanWildon) February 21, 2020
Facebook describes the accessibility of the links as an “intended feature of the product”. The only surprise is that these were indexed and listed by Google. However, Facebook “has no influence on what search engines like Google record”.
Google itself did not make a statement on this topic. But Danny Sullivan, Google's search spokesperson, said in a Twitter post that Google has a tool available to block website content from Google Search.
WhatsApp spokeswoman Alison Bonny said in a statement that invitation links to groups “like any content shared in searchable public channels” can be found by other WhatsApp users. She advises users who want to keep their groups private to simply not share the links publicly.
Can no longer be found on Google
Now WhatsApp seems to have partially fixed the problem by excluding the links from Google Search using the “noindex” meta tag.
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As Jane Manchung Wong writes on Twitter, this currently only applies to Google. Other search engines such as Bing or Duckduckgo still show results when searching for invitation links.
It's great to see WhatsApp taking steps to fix the oversight. It's only the first steps though, because, as an open web,
the search results are still listed on other search engines like Yandex, Bing and DuckDuckGo pic.twitter.com/hTth6HciEe
— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) February 22, 2020
Source: derstandard.at
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