UK wants WhatsApp encryption after attack

Home secretary calls for access to system after Westminster killer sent message

LONDON // British security services must have access to encrypted message applications such as WhatsApp, which was used by the Westminster attacker, the government said yesterday.

Khalid Masood, the 52-yearold Briton who killed four people in a rampage outside parliament before being shot dead on Wednesday, sent a message on WhatsApp that security services could not access, home secretary Amber Rudd said.

Ms Rudd said it was unacceptable that police and security could not crack the heavily encrypted service, which is owned by Facebook.

“You can’t have a situation where you have terrorists talking to each other, where this terrorist sent a WhatsApp message, and it can’t be accessed,” she said. Police said Masood acted alone but they are trying to uncover his motive and identify any accomplices, making the WhatsApp message a clue to his state of mind and his contacts.

A man, 58, remains in custody after being arrested in Birmingham, where Masood had been living. He has not been charged or identified. Ms Rudd said such attacks would be easier to prevent if authorities could penetrate encrypted services after obtaining a warrant similar to those used to listen to telephone calls.

Without a change in the system, she said terrorists could communicate without fear of being overheard, even in cases where a legal warrant had been obtained.

“There should be no place for terrorists to hide,” Ms Rudd said. “We need to make sure that organisations like WhatsApp – and there are plenty of others – don’t provide a secret place for terrorists to communicate.”

She said end-to-end encryption was vital to cyber security, to ensure that business, banking and other transactions were safe – but it must also be accessible.

“You can have a system whereby they can build it so that we can have access to it when it is absolutely necessary.” Ms Rudd did not yet intend to force the industry’s hand with new legislation, but would meet key players on Thursday to discuss this issue, as well as the “constant battle” against extremist videos posted online. US authorities last year fought a legal battle with tech giant Apple to unlock a smartphone used by the perpetrator of a terrorist attack in California. The FBI’s experts broke into the device.

Social media giants are also under pressure over extremist content posted on their sites.

Germany has proposed fining social networks such as Facebook if they fail to wipe illegal hate speech from their sites.

And Google has faced a boycott by companies whose adverts appeared alongside extremist content on its platforms, particularly YouTube.