From Specs to Apps: Verifying and Monitoring Models of Signal and WhatsApp
Researchers use the SpecMon runtime monitor to verify WhatsApp Web and Signal Desktop against formal Signal protocol models, finding undocumented libsignal fork differences.
The paper applies SpecMon, a runtime monitoring tool, to check whether executions of WhatsApp Web and Signal Desktop conform to formal models of the Signal protocol. The authors instrument both applications and build Tamarin-compatible multiset-rewrite models, including the first model of WhatsApp Web's implementation and the most detailed model to date of Signal's original protocol. They verify authentication and secrecy properties for core Signal protocol components, show monitoring detects deliberately injected faults with low overhead, and identify previously undocumented behavioral differences between the original libsignal library and WhatsApp's fork.
- First Tamarin-compatible model of WhatsApp Web's Signal protocol implementation
- Verified authentication and secrecy for core Signal protocol components
- Monitoring exposed undocumented differences between libsignal and WhatsApp's fork
- Injected security faults detected at runtime with low measured overhead
- Development and experiments required three person-weeks of effort
From the original article
1 min read at arxiv.orgThe Signal protocol is a prominent messaging protocol that secures communication for billions of users. It powers WhatsApp, the most widely used messaging application worldwide, and the Signal app, popular among privacy-conscious users. Extensive research in the computational and Dolev-Yao settings provides strong formal security guarantees for the protocol itself.
By Moustafa Said · arxiv.org
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