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Comment by petecooper | Hacker News Reader

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petecooper·

>3. Whatsapp - You always need your phone android

Really? I have iOS here, WhatsApp works fine here and the web app version (https://web.whatsapp.com/) also works fine.

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I think he refers to the fact that WhatsApp sends all data via the phone.

The private keys are only stored on the phone. With WhatsApp you have a session key via the At code you scan. All messages first go to the phone, which decrypts and reencrypts using the session key. Quite sophisticated, but sometimes slow and not working if the phone has no network connectivity or power.

I apologize I misspelled it, I mean "around" not "Android".

…then I retract my comment. Thanks for clarifying.

Does the webapp still not work if your phone is off (perhaps runs out of battery)?

I've just tried – it doesn't appear to work if the phone handset is offline.

you can't use whatsapp web when your phone is not on the same network

In case anyone is interested, the phone plus web combo was apparently the final solution to the thorny problem of establishing identity with the web client without requiring any more info on the user beyond the phone number.

All bets are off, now that it's FB's beast, but the two device solution was intended as a privacy feature, afaik.

I sat next to Pasha Sadri, the web client lead, for 4 months before the acquisition. He mentiond the problem a few times.

The fact it took another 2 years to get the client out seems to indicate that multiple problems were solved in other ways.

It doesn't have to be on the same network, only on the internet and you need to scan the code (see also my response above)

Today I learned - thanks!

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