Viber Launches Full End-to-End Encryption And Hidden Chats

Nathan Ernest Olupot April 19, 2016

1 minute read

Viber, one of the world’s leading messaging apps with more than 711 million unique users worldwide, today announces complete end-to-end encryption across all devices. Image Credit: NeuroGadget

Earlier this month, WhatsApp Inc. turned on full end-to-end encryption for its communications. The company began rolling out encrypting text messages in November 2014, as part of a partnership with Open Whisper Systems, but the protection now extended to voice calls, video, and multi-party chat rooms, for users on both iOS and Android.

As of today, one other social messaging company, Viber, is joining the likes of WhatsApp Inc., Apple Inc., Line Inc. on the wave of app turning on expanded privacy features.

Viber one of the world’s leading messaging apps founded in 2010, now has more than 711 million users. Today, they’re introducing an end-to-end encryption for all messages and calls on its platform across all devices including Android, iPhone, iPad, Android tablets, PC and Mac desktops.

“We take our users’ security and privacy very seriously, and it’s critical to us that they feel confident and protected when using Viber,” said Michael Shmilov, COO of Viber. “Because of this, we have spent a long time working on this latest update to ensure that our users have the most sophisticated security available and maximum control over their communications. We will continue to make this an ongoing priority as digital communication evolves.”

According to the company, the new feature will be rolled out globally in the coming weeks, to all users who have the latest version of Viber – v6.0 or higher.[related-posts]

Hidden Chats
Users will now also be able to hide specific one-on-one or group conversations from the ‘chats’ screen so that no-one knows they exist and access them using a four digit PIN.

Users can hide the conversation by tapping on the info screen for a particular chat. It will then ask for a four digit PIN or, for iOS users, provide an option for a fingerprint.

Users will be notified of a message in a Hidden conversation without the text of the message, or who it is from, appearing on the screen.

This latest update (v6.0), along with the ‘Delete’ feature which allows users to delete messages on the recipient’s phone even after they’ve sent them whether the person has seen it or not demonstrates Viber’s increased focus on putting its users in control of their privacy and personal communications.