Critical WhatsApp Security Bug Crashes the App Using a Group Message

A security vulnerability in WhatsApp for Android and iOS causes the app to completely crash when the target receives a group message.

The so-called “destructive” group chat message can crash WhatsApp for all members of the group, security company Check Point warns, and there’s no way to recover other that uninstalling and reinstalling the application.

Returning to the group chat and restoring the message history is impossible, and the only way to stop the crash loop is to delete the conversation where the message was sent.

The crafted message can be sent from a browser using a debugging tool, and Check Point says that all group messages on both Android and iOS are affected.

Update WhatsApp as soon as possible

The security company reveals that it has already reached out to WhatsApp to report the vulnerability and the Facebook-owned company issued a patch to correct it. Users are recommended to update to the latest version of the app as soon as po...