Who is without WhatsApp cast the first stone. The instant messaging system is so widespread that it is almost impossible to find someone who does not have it installed on their mobile phone. Today through WhatsApp you do everything: you make friends; we get engaged and then we break up; important business communications are made; we organize with relatives; etc.
By now, WhatsApp has so much taken over any other means of communication that even jurisprudence recognizes its legal value: if you intend to prove that you are a victim of stalking, that you have been defamed or insulted, you can also produce WhatsApp messages in court, which can be evaluated by the judge as evidence, however, it is possible that the chats, as they date back in time, have been lost. How to request WhatsApp message printouts? That's exactly what I would like to explain to you with this article. Therefore, if you absolutely need to recover old messages and chats, or you want to know the conversations that took place between other people, continue reading: you will find some useful information.
Index
WhatsApp messages: do they count as evidence in court?
Before seeing how to request WhatsApp message printouts, we need to clarify what an operation of this kind would ever do. Well, the recovery of the chats can be very useful in view of a future judgment, considering that the jurisprudence has now cleared customs the orientation according to which the message received or sent by WhatsApp is considered a proof and, therefore, suitable for entering a both civil and criminal proceedings.
WhatsApp chats: how to use them in court?
If you want to take a WhatsApp chat to court to assert it as evidence in your favor, you can take a screenshot of the mobile phone display; after which, the relative file can be printed, or attached with a USB stick to the file.
The counterpart, however, could contest the document thus formed, believing, for example, that it is a fake or that the chat has been altered. In the event of a dispute, the material cannot be used and that is, that offending message cannot be considered evidence.
In this regard, the judges, however, specified that the simple challenge is not enough, but that this must be accompanied by reasons that justify it (think for example of the failure to indicate the date).
WhatsApp message transcription: how does it work?
Jurisprudence [1] has admitted the transcription of messages. In the event of a dispute as to the authenticity of the message, the party can ask the judge to arrange an official technical advice: the judge will then appoint an expert to whom the smartphone will be delivered. After an examination of the support and the chat, the latter will report the text on an official document (paper) which becomes a real proof in the process.
Smartphone acquisition: what is it?
Another way in which the offending message can enter the trial and, therefore, take on a proof value, was provided by the Supreme Court [2]: the acquisition of the smartphone to the trial. The photographic representation, in fact, has no value without the material support that contains the original. It is only with the latter that one can be sure of the actual authenticity of the print.
WhatsApp message printouts: how to log in?
It is possible that all the methods to use WhatsApp messages in court that we have explained so far are not sufficient: this happens when the chat is no longer on the smartphone, for example because it is deleted. But even more important is the case in which you want to go back to a conversation of others. How to do in these cases? Is it possible to ask for WhatsApp chat reports?
Well, to obtain this result, that is, to recover the chats between other people, it is necessary to rely on special forensic acquisition tools and investigative technical analysis that allow you to arrive at a real expertise on WhatsApp. This report, of course, will have full legal value as evidence in court, which can be used in the judiciary within civil or criminal trials.
Obviously, since conversations can be traced through the records, this operation is very delicate and can be carried out by the personnel of the judicial police only with the authorization of the judge: this is because access to the records compresses one of the fundamental freedoms recognized by the Constitution, which is the secrecy of communications.
WhatsApp records: how does it work?
Accessing WhatsApp conversations is not easy: the technology of this app is designed to protect conversations from prying eyes. In fact, the contents of the conversations are not stored by Whatsapp, since the end-to-end encryption of the chats prevents the servers from accessing the readable content in the clear.
The chats, photos and videos exchanged and what is contained in private conversations is stored only on the devices involved in the private chat or in WhatsApp groups. The only possibility of acquisition that certifies the integrity of the acquired data is therefore to take them from the smartphones on which such messages, photos or videos have been saved.
This means that, if you want to proceed to extract the printouts of WhatsApp messages, the only way is to have access to the smartphone: in other words, the appraisal must necessarily be carried out on the mobile phone in which the chat is stored.
Therefore, to request the printouts of WhatsApp messages it will inevitably be necessary to seize the smartphone or, alternatively, if it is not a matter of crimes, to have it available.
When can WhatsApp printouts be requested?
WhatsApp records relating to conversations that took place between other people can only be requested if there are proven reasons for justice. This means that, for example, during the preliminary investigations it will be possible to ask for printouts to verify the existence of a crime. In such cases, if the judicial authority recognizes the need to recover the printouts of WhatsApp messages, then it will order the seizure of the smartphone and the completion of the necessary extraction operations on it.
On the contrary, if you are interested in getting the printouts from your phone, for example in the case of chats that have now been lost, you can rely on an expert who, through special software, is able to extrapolate the chats you are looking for from your smartphone. Once you have the printouts, you can produce them in court as evidence.
Note
[1] Court of Milan, sent. of 24.10.2017.
[2] Cass. sent. n. 49016/2017.
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