Check Devices Linked to Chat Applications

Many chat applications allow to link another device to the account in order to read and send messages from a computer. It is possible to use that feature to illegitimately get access to the account and messages exchanged by the application, it is thus interesting to check that there is no unknown session or linked devices.

Signal

Go to the "Linked Devices" submenu in your Settings. You will see a list of connected devices, you can tap on any unknown device in order to disconnect it.

A screenshot of the settings panel of the Signal messenger, with 'linked devices' selected A screenshot of the settings panel of the Signal messenger, with 'linked devices' selected

WhatsApp

Go to Parameters (Settings in the menu at the bottom) and click on "WhatsApp Web".

You can see here all the web browsers connected to your WhatsApp account.

A screenshot of WhatsApp, showing that it was last active today at 4:58pm on Chrome on Linux

Telegram

On your Telegram application, visit Settings > Privacy and Security > Active Sessions. This page shows you all the active sessions you have with your account, you can tap on any session to terminate it.

A screenshot of active sessions in the Telegram messenger. It shows sessions in Telegram Web on Chrome on Linux and through a service called `ilovecrumble` running on Linux Desktop

Wire

On the Wire application, click on your profile and go to Settings > Devices. On this page, you can see all the sessions opened for your account, including smartphone applications, desktop applications and web sessions. You can click on any of these sessions and remove the device (you will need your password to do so).

A screenshot of active sessions in Wire messenger. It shows that Wire is running on a Fairphone and on two other devices: a Google Pixel and a Linux install

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