[anon(8719892)]

Who you trust is a personal opinion, we were discussing how the aps worked. Every man for himself.

[anon(8719892)]

Have you read the bbm protected security note? Bbm protected uses End to End crypto. The security note goes into detail about the threat model. Basically the only thing bbm protected doesn't do is use ephemeral keys(Signal uses ephemeral keys). With ephemeral keys each message you send is encrypted with a random key, so if you deleted a conversation (and the app is programmed correctly to delete traces of these keys) there will be no way to retrieve that conversation even if your device is recovered, say by the government. With bbm protected there is a single signing and encryption key pair per contact. This key doesn't change and is used in conjunction with keying material to generate each message key. As long as no one gets access to your keys your communication is safe.

http://help.blackberry.com/detectLan...-security-pdf/

Posted via CB10

I agree with everything you say BUT it appears the encrypted chat still remains on BBRY's servers (and is then backed up). This is my point. I am not questioning BBP's encryption strength.

[anon(8719892)]

Have you read the bbm protected security note? Bbm protected uses End to End crypto. The security note goes into detail about the threat model. Basically the only thing bbm protected doesn't do is use ephemeral keys(Signal uses ephemeral keys). With ephemeral keys each message you send is encrypted with a random key, so if you deleted a conversation (and the app is programmed correctly to delete traces of these keys) there will be no way to retrieve that conversation even if your device is recovered, say by the government. With bbm protected there is a single signing and encryption key pair per contact. This key doesn't change and is used in conjunction with keying material to generate each message key. As long as no one gets access to your keys your communication is safe.

http://help.blackberry.com/detectLan...-security-pdf/

Posted via CB10

I agree with everything you say BUT it appears the encrypted chat still remains on BBRY's servers (and is then backed up). This is my point. I am not questioning BBP's encryption strength.

[tollfeeder]

Who you trust is a personal opinion, we were discussing how the aps worked. Every man for himself.

WUT oO ?!

Via Pasta CB10

[Richard Buckley]

I agree with everything you say BUT it appears the encrypted chat still remains on BBRY's servers (and is then backed up). This is my point. I am not questioning BBP's encryption strength.

Any chat system that has the property where Alice can transmit a message to Bob, when Bob is off the network, and Bob can later receive the message when Alice is off the network must have the property that the messages are stored on some intermediate system that is always on the network. Otherwise the only way Alice can send a message to Bob is when both are on the network at the time the message is sent.

Even if you implemented a system that required both Alice and Bob to be on the network simultaneously, a third party with enough visibility on the network could intercept and save the message. If this threat model is important to you, then you want to have end-to-end encryption such that no third parties have access to the keys.

LeapSTR100-2/10.3.2.2876

[jope28]

Any chat system that has the property where Alice can transmit a message to Bob, when Bob is off the network, and Bob can later receive the message when Alice is off the network must have the property that the messages are stored on some intermediate system that is always on the network. Otherwise the only way Alice can send a message to Bob is when both are on the network at the time the message is sent.

Even if you implemented a system that required both Alice and Bob to be on the network simultaneously, a third party with enough visibility on the network could intercept and save the message. If this threat model is important to you, then you want to have end-to-end encryption such that no third parties have access to the keys.

LeapSTR100-2/10.3.2.2876

Thanks for the clarification regarding BBM Protected going through BlackBerry servers.
Hope they come up with an innovative way for Alice and Bob's communications not needing to go through that 3rd party (in the case of BBM Protected it's BlackBerry servers) and still get messages through even when one is out of network range temporarily.

I'm guessing it would take a company like BlackBerry to come up with a creative design of making the devices themselves serve as servers or some great computer engineering technique/idea (just hoping it can one day be possible lol).

Alice and Bob remain hopeful that someday they can have end-to-end encryption without that going through a 3rd party server.

I just wish they made purchasing BBM Protected as easy as it is to buy stickers on BBM!


 Passport/SQW100-3 .2876 CB10 

[Richard Buckley]

Thanks for the clarification regarding BBM Protected going through BlackBerry servers.
Hope they come up with an innovative way for Alice and Bob's communications not needing to go through that 3rd party (in the case of BBM Protected it's BlackBerry servers) and still get messages through even when one is out of network range temporarily.

I'm guessing it would take a company like BlackBerry to come up with a creative design of making the devices themselves serve as servers or some great computer engineering technique/idea (just hoping it can one day be possible lol).

Alice and Bob remain hopeful that someday they can have end-to-end encryption without that going through a 3rd party server.

I just wish they made purchasing BBM Protected as easy as it is to buy stickers on BBM!


 Passport/SQW100-3 .2876 CB10 

Not possible. If Alice and Bob are never on the network simultaneously, there needs to be a third system to store the message, though it could be run by Alice or Bob. This is no different than voice calls. If Bob isn't available when Alice makes a phone call, the message won't be passed unless Bob has call answer (a third party) or an answering machine (a third system run by Bob).

The only way to avoid a third party or third system is to require that Bob and Alice be on the network simultaneously for the traffic to be passed, otherwise it fails. You could make it stay on Alice's phone until they are both on, but that may take a long time. Who has a mobile phone but not call answer these days? I think such a limitation would be a non-starter for most users except is very specific use cases which aren't going to be commercially successful.

LeapSTR100-2/10.3.2.2876

[David Tyler]

Understood but my question is do both versions have data that passes through BlackBerry servers which can be decrypted by BlackBerry and handed over to the authorities if warranted?

This is the reason my friends asked me to get one of the said apps above
Posted via CB10

No; BBM Protected traffic can't be decrypted by BlackBerry.

Passport SE: All the snooty prestige of a device with a precious metal in the name at less than half the price!

[agentfat2004]

I agree with everything you say BUT it appears the encrypted chat still remains on BBRY's servers (and is then backed up). This is my point. I am not questioning BBP's encryption strength.

By definition, if the encryption is any good, leaving encrypted copies of any messages shouldn't be a problem. Think of it this way, even if BlackBerry isn't storing it, the NSA is. When the engineers design encryption standards they have to think of how to mitigate what is called "Man in the middle" attacks. This is where if Alice tries to initiate a secure chat with Bob, blackberry or the NSA will pretend to be Bob when chatting with Alice, and pretend to be Alice when chatting with Bob. They can do this in a passive manner to just listen in, or they can be active and send lies to either one. So in this case the Man in the middle could be blackberry or it could be the NSA. You want to design a protocol so that you are not susceptible to those kinds of attacks. This is what end to end encryption means. Basically if something is end to end encrypted only the people at the 2 ends can actually understand what is being said.

Now usually in order to prevent a Man in the middle, you will usually do some kind of key verification. In bbm protected keys can be manually verified. So when you start a chat with someone, you can text,email or manually give them what is called a passphrase(e.g. Call them or do it in person). If the passphrase match, then bbm will know the key exchange is valid(ssee attached image). BlackBerry also has something called autopassphrase, where blackberry does the passphrase for you. In this scenario if they wanted to they could potentially do a bad thing and intercept you. If however you worried about about blackberry doing something like that you should probably worry about them just sending an os update that logs every key you type, basically you goto trust something.

Now as far as BlackBerry saving your communications there are some kinds of information they have access to, but with an end to end encryption that is no different than the information your phone company has when using phone Internet, or that you Internet company has on you when using wifi.they can see who you are messaging, and how big the message is or good old NSA. There are some protocols to hide this information, but bbm isn't one.(bbm encrypts tragic to its service, so the Internet providers will only know that it's bbm traffic)

Posted via CB10

[agentfat2004]

Here is a bbm passphrase exchange


Posted via CB10

[anon(8719892)]

By definition, if the encryption is any good, leaving encrypted copies of any messages shouldn't be a problem.

I agree but compared to 'Not leaving them there', its a huge weakness.

[anon(8719892)]

Here is a bbm passphrase exchange

RE: the automated exchange? I am guessing it is more secure to have a new key generated for every chat rather than just once per contract?

[agentfat2004]

RE: the automated exchange? I am guessing it is more secure to have a new key generated for every chat rather than just once per contract?

Kind of. Security is really based on your threat model. So it's a little more complicated than that. Basically blackberry uses what they call a session key. The session key is unique between the persons involvedd in a chat(i am not sure how group chats work). Each time you send a message bbm protected generates some random keying material combines it with your session key and encrypts the message, followed by a number of other things. So in a sense BlackBerry uses a different key for each message. The important thing is that the session key is always the same and the keying material is sent in plain text. If someone (say the nsa) is recording everything, then later they get access to the session key(either from your device or the person you are chatting with) they can go back and decrypt your messages. This will probably require physical access to your device, so if you are only worried about blackberry or some random stranger accessing your message you are probably safe.

There are some protocols (OTR, Signal), that use ephemeral keys. They are done in such a way that once the message is sent the keys are forgotten and there is no way to get them back, so even if someone stole your device they probably would only get what is visible in the chat window. What blackberry has is good enough (good enough for nation states even). I still need to read the security note for secusmart, but I believe secusmart uses ephemeral keys, but it costs a whole lot more than bbm protected and doesn't support protected plus.

Posted via CB10

[agentfat2004]

I agree but compared to 'Not leaving them there', its a huge weakness.

It's not really much of a weakness as a system designed with good tradeoffs. Even if you are concerned with BlackBerry, they are not the only ones who could be storing your communication. You will have to worry about your Internet provider, whoever owns the actual Internet or satellites your communications pass through and the same for the person you send your message to. Unless you own the entire network and can physically support it there is nothing you can really do to prevent people from storing your information. The best you can do is ensure its end to end encrypted, and even in that case you will still be leaking metadata.

Also if blackberry didn't store the messages, how would they be able to deliver the message if someone's phone died and they just recharged it? It would be nice if people weren't just saving everything, but such is the world we live in

Posted via CB10

[byex]

RE: the automated exchange? I am guessing it is more secure to have a new key generated for every chat rather than just once per contract?

You can auto generate passphrases as many times as you want in BBM protected. Depends on how big the tin foil hat is. The bigger it is the more passphrases needed.

Posted via CB10

[whatsever]

Message that stored in the cloud only be there for a while and mostly a few hours after that it's gone an you have send it again. I believe the cloud storage of bbm is limited also with space. So if it gets full old message are lost and the sender get a message of not delivery.


Posted via CB10

[anon(8719892)]

Did anyone get the mail shot selling BBM protected and video? I cant put my hands on it, but the way it was word its obvious BBM is not secure. It included a 'peace of mind' type quote for Law Enforcement BBRY would comply. Even BBMP is stored on servers forever & it looks like they CAN access them. If anyone has the mailshot uploaded it please.

[Richard Buckley]

Did anyone get the mail shot selling BBM protected and video? I cant put my hands on it, but the way it was word its obvious BBM is not secure. It included a 'peace of mind' type quote for Law Enforcement BBRY would comply. Even BBMP is stored on servers forever & it looks like they CAN access them. If anyone has the mailshot uploaded it please.

A little Googling finds the white paper quite easily. BBM Protected, when in use on both ends provides device to device end to end encryption with the key material controlled by the end users. As documented and when used as described it doe not matter if BlackBerry stores the messages for ever, only the end user devices can decrypt them.

https://help.blackberry.com/detectLa...-security-pdf/

LeapSTR100-2/10.3.2.2876

[anon(8719892)]

It's the wording on the Mailshot that was bizarre. Hence the fuss I made about it. *sighs*

[Richard Buckley]

It's the wording on the Mailshot that was bizarre. Hence the fuss I made about it. *sighs*

Never make decisions based on marketing material unless you are willing to decide with your heart, not your mind, and live with that decision regardless of how bad it may have been.

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