in the face of freely available software programs, it is nowadays even for lay people are no longer a Problem to edit the images later. With just a few clicks, a holiday let, for example, photos nachoptimieren or by a Filter on the old trim. No, saith this, as long as for private purposes. It is different, however, when images are manipulated to make specific mood and by messenger service, in the worst case, a thousand-fold are common.

Whatsapp has announced in the past year, to strengthen the fight against counterfeiting, and false reports procedure and had a good two months of action. So users can forward and since the end of January a message, only to five recipients, which is intended to limit a proliferation of Fakes. In the future, the company wants to seem to go a step further, such as the usual well-informed Blog “WABetaInfo” reported. Thus, Whatsapp is currently testing a feature to help users to detect fake pictures easier.

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Whatsapp in trial version with integrated reverse search of images

Selected testers a Beta-Version of the App can, according to the report, a received image on Whatsapp due to the encryption no access – a reverse search on Google. Thanks to a interface (API), you can upload the Tester a by Messenger the course schicktes image directly from the App in Google’s image search. There, the image is compared with similar photos from the Internet, the search result is then displayed in a browser window.

The user learns, among other things, when the picture was first uploaded, or gets, ideally, additional information about the background and context of the recording supplied. A received photo in front of, for example, to show a daily current event, according to Google, but even before months or even years, for the first time the Internet showed up, so it is immediately clear that the supposed connection may not exist. In the best case results are to be found in the search also Links from trusted sites that have exposed the picture as a fake.

If and when Whatsapp will turn off the feature for all users, according to the “WABetaInfo” is still unclear. In the meantime, should the user just in case of sources to be suspicious and critical questions, whether a piece of Information, if you are really or if perhaps it is trying to spread rumors and false reports deliberately.

source: Blog “WABetaInfo”