Viber, the global messaging and voice app, says it has taken careful steps to ensure data remains secure and private, following a recent outcry over privacy options on social networks by users.
Growing concerns have also risen about certain social and messaging apps harvesting private messages and using them as valuable data for their systems’ algorithms—or for their advertisers.
“Given that there are over eight million Viber users in the country and the phenomenal growth of Viber stickers with more than 100 million being sent and received monthly among Sri Lankans, Viber assures all users of have automatic protection through encryption,” Viber, part of Rakuten Inc - a world leader in e-commerce and financial services-, said in a media release on Tuesday.
Viber’s default end-to-end encryption provides stronger security in every voice or video call, message, video and photo, in both group and one-on-one messages where not even Viber can see, read or have access to them.
Anubhav Nayyar, Head of South East Asia Viber said, “Sri Lanka is a major market in South Asia for Viber and we understand privacy and security is a serious concern among our many users. While other messaging applications may require users to manually enable encryption, end-to-end encryption on Viber is on by default so users don’t have to worry about turning it on and has been standard on the app since the feature was made available.”
When a Viber message is sent, whether on mobile or desktop, the data travels from the device to the recipient’s as a scrambled code so that only their device has the unique key to translate to plain text.
Once the message has been delivered, none of the data is stored on Viber’s servers. In case the device is offline, Viber stores only the encrypted version of the message for a limited time, still safe and secure, until their device connects to the internet and is able to receive what has been sent.
As a result users have little concern or worries about suddenly receiving a targeted ad related to the subject of their private conversation—Viber cannot and will not, in any way, share their personal messages with anyone.
“Viber is all about making sure our users can enjoy better ways of communicating every day, and a big part of that is assuring that the connections made are strengthened by secure measures users can always count on,” Mr. Nayyar noted.