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  • WhatsApp Rolls Out Lockdown-Style Security Mode to Protect Targeted Users From Spyware

    WhatsApp Rolls Out Lockdown-Style Security Mode to Protect Targeted Users From Spyware


    Ravie LakshmananJan 27, 2026Mobile Security / Spyware

    Meta on Tuesday announced it’s adding Strict Account Settings on WhatsApp to secure certain users against advanced cyber attacks because of who they are and what they do.

    The feature, similar to Lockdown Mode in Apple iOS and Advanced Protection in Android, aims to protect individuals, such as journalists or public-facing figures, from sophisticated spyware by trading some functionality for enhanced security.

    Once this security mode is enabled, some of the account settings will be locked to the most restrictive options, while simultaneously blocking attachments and media from people not in a user’s contacts.

    “This lockdown-style feature bolsters your security on WhatsApp even further with just a few taps by locking your account to the most restrictive settings like automatically blocking attachments and media from unknown senders, silencing calls from people you don’t know, and restricting other settings that may limit how the app works,” Meta said.

    Cybersecurity

    The feature can be enabled by navigating to Settings > Privacy > Advanced. Meta said the feature is rolling out gradually over the coming weeks.

    In tandem, the social media giant said it’s adopting the use of the Rust programming language in its media sharing functionality to help keep users’ photos, videos, and messages safe from spyware attacks. It described the development as the “largest rollout globally of any library written in Rust.”

    The company also said the use of Rust made it possible to develop a secure, high-performance, cross-platform library (“wamedia”) for media sharing in WhatsApp across devices, adding it’s investing in a three-pronged approach to combat memory safety issues –

    • Design the product to minimize unnecessary attack surface exposure
    • Invest in security assurance for the remaining C and C++ code
    • By default, the choice of memory-safe languages for new code

    “WhatsApp has added protections like CFI, hardened memory allocators, safer buffer handling APIs, and more,” the company said. “This is an important step forward in adding additional security behind the scenes for users and part of our ongoing defense-in-depth approach.”



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  • Former French senator found guilty of drugging MP

    Former French senator found guilty of drugging MP


    Getty Images A headshot of Joel Guerriau Getty Images

    A former French senator has been found guilty of spiking an MP’s drink with ecstasy in order to sexually assault her.

    Joel Guerriau received a four-year prison sentence – 18 months of which are to be served behind bars – and, according to local media, was ordered to pay Sandrine Josso €5,000 (£4,348) in damages for emotional distress.

    Guerriau, now 68, had invited Josso, 50, to his Paris flat in November 2023. He later admitted serving her a drink spiked with MDMA, but maintained it was an accident and denied having any intention of assaulting her.

    Shortly after the verdict on Tuesday, Josso said it was a “huge relief”, AFP reports. Meanwhile, Guerriau’s lawyers said he would appeal.

    According to court documents quoted by French media, Josso said she had gone to Guerrieau’s home three years ago to celebrate his re-election when she started feeling unwell after drinking from a champagne glass.

    “I had gone to visit a friend and I discovered an aggressor,” she said on Monday while giving evidence in the trial.

    “He looked at me insistently, I’d never seen him that way. I didn’t want to show him my weakness, because I was worried that if I told him I wasn’t feeling well, he would’ve forced me to lie down.”

    Josso recalled managing to leave the flat and, with the help of a colleague, went to hospital where a toxicology report confirmed her blood had three times the recreational dose of MDMA.

    Guerriau told the court he had been going through a period of depression, and had meant to take the drug himself the night before. He did not end up doing so and accidentally offered the glass containing MDMA to Josso the following evening, he said.

    “I feel sorry for Sandrine,” Guerriau told the court in Paris. “I am disgusted with myself, with my recklessness and my stupidity.”

    He added: “We don’t talk about the effects of these drugs enough… All I want is to speak out on the dangers of these products.”

    Getty Images French MP Sandrine JossoGetty Images

    Sandrine Josso remains an MP for the centre-right MoDem party

    Asked about the several internet searches he made around ecstasy and the drug GHB, he said he had no recollection.

    “I was on the train, thoughts and ideas just come to you,” he told the court, adding government members needed to show an interest in “all current events”.

    Guerriau, a centre-right senator from the Horizons party, was suspended when the charges against him came to light. He resigned as a senator last October.

    Josso, who is still an MP for the centre-right MoDem, has become a staunch campaigner against so-called chemical submission – drug-facilitated sexual assault.

    “What I went through is still very painful,” Josso said, speaking to French media ahead of the trial beginning.

    “Psychological trauma feels like being frozen in time… I jump at the slightest thing. I’ve become very vulnerable.”

    Josso has gone on to join an association against chemical submission, set up by Caroline Darian – the daughter of Dominique Pelicot, who in 2024 was found guilty of drugging his wife Gisele and inviting men to rape her in their home for over a decade.

    Josso was often in court during the Pelicot trial. This week, Darian and her brother David attended the proceedings in the Guerriau case.



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  • Families sue US over deadly boat strike off Venezuela coast

    Families sue US over deadly boat strike off Venezuela coast


    The families of two Trinidadian men killed in a US strike on an alleged drug-smuggling boat have filed a lawsuit against the American government.

    Lawyers filed the claim in Boston’s federal court on behalf of relatives of Chad Joseph and Rishi Samaroo, among six men killed off the coast of Venezuela on 14 October.

    One of the lawyers said in a statement that the strike amounted to “lawless killings in cold blood; killings for sport and killings for theatre”.

    The US has struck at least 36 vessels in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific since September, killing more than 120 people. The Trump administration has said it is targeting “narco-terrorists” carrying drugs that kill Americans.

    The US has positioned its operations as a non-international armed conflict with the alleged traffickers, but legal experts say they could be in violation of the laws governing such conflict.

    This lawsuit was filed on Tuesday under the Death on the High Seas Act, which allows family members to sue for wrongful deaths on the high seas, and is a statute that allows foreign citizens to sue in US courts for violating international law.

    The case was brought by Joseph’s mother and Samaroo’s sister, who say the two men did fishing and farm work in Venezuela, and were returning to Trinidad and Tobago when their boat was struck.

    Joseph’s mother Sallycar Korasingh added that if the US government believed her son had done something wrong, “it should have arrested, charged and detained him, not murdered him”.

    The lawsuit argues that the killings should be deemed a wrongful death because the men were not taking part in military hostilities against the US.

    The Pentagon has not yet responded to requests for comment.

    It comes after the family of a Colombian man, who was killed in a separate US strike, took their case to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.



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