WhatsApp Faces New Challenge

A security researcher says he has discovered a potential privacy glitch in text-messaging service WhatsApp that occurs when users switch phone numbers. Xuyang Li, founder of TrustGo Mobile, says that when he downloaded WhatsApp, he inherited the account information of a woman named Jessica, the previous owner of Li's phone number. Li's WhatsApp messages appeared to recipients to be messages from Jessica -- complete with a profile photo of Jessica wearing a red scarf.

WhatsApp was lauded for its simplicity when Facebook agreed to acquire it in February 2014 for $19 billion. New users register only their phone numbers, and don't create usernames or passwords. Li's incident highlights how that simplicity might work against WhatsApp in this case.