14 DAY TRIAL // A new feature is now available in CyanogenMod 10.2 nightly builds, in the form of WhisperPush, which should provide users with secure messaging capabilities on their devices.
The feature has already been integrated into said ROMs, and it should become available for other CM builds as well, offering system-wide secure messaging functionality that is also compatible with TextSecure.
This is an open source cross-platform (iOS and Android) client aimed at encrypting SMS messages both locally and over-the-air when sending them to another TextSecure user.
“The application is maintained by Open WhisperSystems, and lead engineer Moxie Marlinspike,” a post on the CyanogenMod blog explains.
“Moxie is a veteran of open source software, cryptography and good encryption practices, and a privacy advocate. To learn more about him and his accomplishments check out his personal site and Wikipedia page. He’s also spent time as a speaker at DEFCON on multiple occasions.”
Moxie also took care of the CyanogenMod implementation of TextSecure and focused on ensuring that CM users would enjoy both increased security and compatibility with existing services.
However, there is also a unique feature in the CM implementation, namely SMS middleware functionality, which allows for the encrypted messaging capabilities to be provided for most SMS applications that users take advantage of.
As soon as a CM user sends a message to another CM or TextSecure user, the SMS will be encrypted and secured. However, should the other party be on a device without CM or TextSecure, the implementation will fall back to a normal SMS message.
“Today, we are launching our version initially into the CM 10.2 nightly stream to test the server load and make sure things are working at scale. Once things are dialed in, we’ll also enable this for CM 11 builds moving forward,” the CM team announced.
Furthermore, CyanogenMod also announced that the source code for the feature had been already made public, and that those interested in having a closer look at it should head over to GitHub for that.