What is Signal and should US officials have used it to share Yemen air strike plans?
The Trump administration has downplayed the security breach, dismissing it as the 'only glitch in two months.'
READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/03/26/what-is-signal-and-should-us-officials-have-used-it-to-share-yemen-air-strike-plans
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The Trump administration has downplayed the security breach, dismissing it as the 'only glitch in two months.'
READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/03/26/what-is-signal-and-should-us-officials-have-used-it-to-share-yemen-air-strike-plans
Subscribe to our channel. Euronews is available on Dailymotion in 12 languages
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NewsTranscript
00:00Is Signal safe for sharing sensitive government intel?
00:09Messaging app Signal is under the spotlight after a journalist was added to a group chat
00:14where senior U.S. officials discussed imminent airstrikes on Yemen.
00:20But was Signal the right place for this conversation and were national security laws breached?
00:25We spoke to a cryptographer who explained that Signal is the gold standard in encrypted
00:30conversations.
00:31It uses a form of end-to-end encryption that means only the sender and recipient of messages
00:37can decrypt the data and access the messages.
00:40No third party, not even Signal itself, has any access.
00:44Its encryption code is also open source, meaning cybersecurity experts can scrutinize its compliance
00:50with the highest standards.
00:52But here's the catch.
00:53The weakest point is the device itself.
00:56Mobile devices can be hacked with spyware through the telecommunications network or
01:02even by using antennas to pick up signals from the handset.
01:06Trump's Ukraine and Middle East envoy Steve Whitkoff, a member of the group chat, was
01:11reportedly in Moscow while the conversation was happening.
01:15Experts tell us if he did open the chat while in Russia, there was a real risk of interception.
01:22Russian officials should use dedicated devices with watertight security settings and where
01:26apps like Signal cannot be downloaded.
01:30Some of the Signal messages were also reportedly programmed to disappear after one or four
01:35weeks.
01:36Experts told us this could also violate US laws on the preservation of official records.