The VU knows that a lot of students use WhatsApp for communication purposes. However, this is not without risk. Though VU Amsterdam is not responsible for your use of WhatsApp, we feel the urge to provide you some tips from VU IT to help you stay safe!

My whatsapp has been hacked! What now?

Hackers are inventive and try all sorts of ways to infiltrate different systems including WhatsApp. How do you prevent them from taking over your account? And what do you do when it happens?

Hackers try to activate your WhatsApp account on a different mobile device. If they succeed, they can communicate on behalf of you as well as read all your incoming messages. How is this possible? You probably unconsciously helped them with this. Did you maybe recently forward a text that someone asked for? Or do you maybe use a simple code to access your voicemail? The hacker needs this code to get access to your account. They can try this in three ways:

1. Phishing

The attacker has (for example by pretending to be someone else - maybe he has been able to get his hands on the phone of one of your contacts) convinced you to send him the SMS-code that you have received.

2. Verification code

When requesting the verification code for WhatsApp, the attacker has asked to send it to your voicemail box. If you have a very simple access code to your voicemail box, the hacker is able to intercept the verification code.

3. SMS

The attacker has been able to intercept the SMS. If this happened and you know for sure that the situations described in 1 and 2 did not happen, contact the IT Servicedesk.

What to do when your account has been hacked?

Inform your contacts! An attacker with malicious intentions could pretend to be you. It is very well possible that the attacker victimise others, tries to get hold of the verification code of others, or send strange/odd messages on your behalf. There are two recovery actions that you can try:

Try to log in again in WhatsApp

You should receive a verification code on your phone. If you fill in the code, WhatsApp knows that all messages should be sent to your phone again. The hacker is automatically ‘logged out’. If this is successful, secure your account as described further below.

Deleting your account and reinstalling

It’s possible that you don’t receive a verification code. In that case the only remaining option is to delete your account. You can do this in the WhatsApp menu. Afterwards you can reinstall WhatsApp and register again.

Security of your WhatsApp

You can secure your WhatsApp account against hacking attacks, by applying the so-called ‘two-step verification’. This way your account will also be protected by a pincode. You can do this by going to Settings - Account - Verification in two steps. From now on every attempt to verify your phone number on WhatsApp has to go together with the PIN code existing of six numbers. You have created this PIN yourself.

Do not send codes or passwords

Always be conscious of the existing security risks. Never forward codes or passwords and make use of two-step verification as much as possible. Try limiting the use of WhatsApp (or other messaging apps) for formal and business related communications.