Skip to main content

Snapchat hopes to stop copycats by acquiring the Strong.Codes team

Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but when you’re the cat who keeps getting copied, all that flattery may be a bit much. That certainly appears to be Snapchat’s mentality, as parent company Snap recently acquired the team that created Strong.Codes, a firm known for obscuring software code, thereby making it more difficult to rip off. At the beginning of the year, Snap hired Laurnet Balmelli, one of the engineers who co-founded Strong.Codes. And in the months since, the rest of the four-person team has jumped ship to Snap. While not all of the quartet will move to California (the latest hires are staying in Switzerland), Strong.Codes has shuttered.

According to Bloomberg, this is by no means the only moves Snap is making to ensure that Snapchat plays its cards as close to the chest as possible. After all, a number of other social media platforms have released eerily similar features to the ephemeral photo app in recent months, sometimes even beating Snapchat at its own game. But now, it looks as though Snap is trying to turn things around, and as Bloomberg reports, is now advertising across Switzerland in hopes of hiring information-security experts and cryptographers in the European nation.

Recommended Videos

Snap also appears to be ramping up its European presence as a whole, as the company is serving as one of the leading sponsors of cybersecurity conference Black Alps 17, which is being held near Geneva, Switzerland. A couple months ago, Snap hired an ex-Facebook employee to head up operations in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland as well.

While Snapchat remains a popular app, founder and CEO Evan Spiegel and his investors may have cause for concern. After a much-hyped IPO, the company hasn’t been performing all that well financially. On Tuesday, July 18, shares hit an all-time low of $14.65, and it is reported that the declining stock price has dropped the net worth of Spiegel and co-founder Bobby Murphy a staggering $4.3 billion.

So look out, developers. Snap could soon be guarding its code base with an iron wall, courtesy of the folks behind Strong.Code.

Lulu Chang
Fascinated by the effects of technology on human interaction, Lulu believes that if her parents can use your new app…
Bluesky finally adds a feature many had been waiting for
A blue sky with clouds.

Bluesky has been making a lot of progress in recent months by simplifying the process to sign up while at the same time rolling out a steady stream of new features.

As part of those continuing efforts, the social media app has just announced that users can now send direct messages (DMs).

Read more
Reddit just achieved something for the first time in its 20-year history
The Reddit logo.

Reddit’s on a roll. The social media platform has just turned a profit for the first time in its 20-year history, and now boasts a record 97.2 million daily active users, marking a year-over-year increase of 47%. A few times during the quarter, the figure topped 100 million, which Reddit CEO and co-founder Steve Huffman said in a letter to shareholders had been a “long-standing milestone” for the site.

The company, which went public in March, announced the news in its third-quarter earnings results on Tuesday.

Read more
Worried about the TikTok ban? This is how it might look on your phone
TikTok splash screen on an Android phone.

The US Supreme Court has decided to uphold a law that would see TikTok banned in the country on January 19. Now, the platform has issued an official statement, confirming that it will indeed shut down unless it gets some emergency relief from the outgoing president.

“Unless the Biden Administration immediately provides a definitive statement to satisfy the most critical service providers assuring non-enforcement, unfortunately TikTok will be forced to go dark on January 19,” said the company soon after the court’s verdict.
So, what does going dark mean?
So, far, there is no official statement on what exactly TikTok means by “going dark.” There is a lot of speculation out there on how exactly the app or website will look once TikTok shutters in the US.

Read more