Speaking as a former Facebook engineer, I would expect pushing some kind of “feature flag” (global configuration option) which prevented the service connecting for people with a “+44” phone number.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pretty simple. Geo blocking could be done similarly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Feature_toggle?wprov=sfla1<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n 2\/n) When you’re coding for at-scale platforms you quickly realise the utility of creating a tool to divide users into groups by {country, language, phone-number, userid-modulo-N-test-group, employee\/non-employee} \u2014 and then THAT tool gets used for everything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3\/n) At Facebook-proper this tool was\/is “Gatekeeper” and it’s the software which is used to switch you between seeing new-user-interface vs: old-user-interface, that sort of thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nice essay about Gatekeeper, here:<\/p>\n\n\n\n https:\/\/launchdarkly.com\/blog\/secret-to-facebooks-hacker-engineering-culture\/<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n 4\/n) True story: I was working on some logging code once & had pushed it to production, only then to realise there was a potential bug which would’ve been embarrassing\u2026but I’d wrapped it in Gatekeeper controls, so I switched it off in the last seconds before it went live. <\/p>\n\n\n\n 5\/n) WhatsApp will have something similar, not least because someone will have anticipated the need for a bunch of phones to be switched-off by international dial prefix, e.g. in case the USA declared Libyan use to be export-controlled\/illegal, or something.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 6\/n) So WhatsApp could probably NOW make their clients shut-down service to both of:<\/p>\n\n\n\n – anyone apparently inside the UK \u2026trivially, by pushing a configuration update and waiting for clients to refresh their settings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n About 5 mins work for 1 person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 7\/7) With centralised platforms it’s not a big technical challenge to switch off service to a country; it’s a political and legal-exposure (i.e. “lawsuits”) one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But if the alternative is “make your software raddled with British Government spyware”, then it’s likely worth it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Originally tweeted by Alec Muffett (@AlecMuffett<\/a>) on 2023\/04\/23<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I’ve already written a blogpost that is broadly about that<\/a>, but I should note in passing that we have seen this battle before: when the UK, France, Sweden, etc, all petitioned Apple and Google to provide them with exceptional privileges in iOS and Android, to enable their own homegrown COVID apps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That did not end well for the petitioning nations<\/a>, for instance the UK:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The UK is abandoning its current contact tracing app for Google and Apple\u2019s system<\/strong> \u2026and\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n– anyone with a +44 prefix<\/p>\n\n\n\nPostscript: but what if WhatsApp simply waits to be blocked by the UK Government for non-compliance?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>https:\/\/www.technologyreview.com\/2020\/06\/18\/1004097\/the-uk-is-abandoning-its-current-contact-tracing-app-for-google-and-apples-system\/<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n