Shailesh Shrivastava email: s.shrivastava@mobilenapps.com
The popular applications Snapchat and Facebook Poke, allowing to send self-destructive messages, may see some bad time in coming days, that too because of their most popular feature.
The applications, which gained popularity because of the limited shelf-life of the content shared, have been put in question by a recent report that found some flaws with their security features.
A report by Buzzfeed suggests that a security flaw in both the applications makes it possible to save the videos sent on Snapchat and Poke.
The flaw will only be able to save videos and not the text and the pictures, however, the bug can be worked upon and pictures can also become insecure.
The discovery of bug sends clear message to those users who were using the applications for 'sexting' instead of sharing normal content.
According to Buzzfeed, if the receiver of the video wants to save the video, he/she should not open it after loading it. Opening the video will remove it from the temp files and it will be destructed after some time.
After loading the video follow these steps to save the clip.
Step 1: Connect your iPhone to your computer
Step 2: Open iPhone file browser
Step 3: Go to the Snapchat folder
Step 4: Open 'tmp' folder
Step 5: Find the video and save it
The biggest problem the users will face with this bug is that the sender will never get to know that the video has been saved by the receiver.
The security features of both the applications allow sender to receive an alert message when the receiver takes a screenshot of the content. However, in case of saving the file, nothing like that happens.
Snapchat had recently come across an unexpected exploit in Android in which the unviewed videos were available in the Android gallery.
Talking to Buzzfeed over the issue, Snapchat founder Evan Spiegel said, "The people who most enjoy using Snapchat are those who embrace the spirit and intent of the service. There will always be ways to reverse engineer technology products - but that spoils the fun!"
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