[HN Gopher] Getting Started with Signal
___________________________________________________________________
Getting Started with Signal
Author : JustinGarrison
Score : 255 points
Date : 2021-01-11 18:02 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.justingarrison.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.justingarrison.com)
| shireboy wrote:
| I'll probably burn some karma on this, but I have to ask as I'm
| genuinely trying to form a consistent opinion on these topics and
| understand better. Given that lots of people on HN are advocating
| in favor of Parler being deplatformed on the grounds it was used
| by groups to advocate and coordinate violence, and given that
| it's not a stretch to imagine that e2e encrypted communication
| apps like Signal have groups on them spreading "fake news" and
| "advocating violence" and cannot be moderated, how does one
| reconcile supporting Signal/Telegram/WhatsApp, but not Parler?
| What's the fundamental moral or technical difference that makes
| one ethical but not the other?
| erentz wrote:
| I believe the support for Signal comes from the privacy it
| offers from Facebook, et al., and by extension also possibly
| the government (Snowden, et al.), not because it can be used to
| coordinate violence.
| [deleted]
| drieddust wrote:
| Just emotions that sacrosanct capitol was breached by fascist
| Trump's supporters.
|
| That begs the question which platforms were used for organizing
| BLM riots for months and why there aren't any consequences?
|
| Companies claiming to uphold democracy are the worst offenders
| if it makes business or idealogical sense yet HN crowd is
| cheering. Look at how they are willing to suck upto China,
| Iran, and even Taliban.
|
| Disclaimer: Trump is a unreliable character so I don't like him
| personally a lot. But cheering up one-sided suppression without
| looking at the full picture is distasteful.
| ende wrote:
| Cringe.
| drieddust wrote:
| You say this without any data or evidence. I am not an
| American so I have no skin in this game.
| godelski wrote:
| I see the stances as very different. Parler is a social media
| site _dedicated_ to extremism. While I believe in their 1st
| amendment right to exist (not all speech is protected though) I
| do not like this group. On the other hand I see companies like
| Signal and CloudFlare as being neutral. They have taken a
| position that they choose not to be the arbiters of right and
| wrong. These companies also aren 't _dedicated_ to extremism. I
| believe that being able to speak freely and make mistakes is an
| essential part of democracy. A privacy preserving platform
| protects this idea. If the service is _dedicated_ to the public
| (aka neutral) then I think this is the right move. Extremists
| will (and have) congregate on Signal (as they do on WA,
| Telegram, Twitter, 4Chan, Facebook, etc). I see encryption
| orthogonal to the issue of extremism. This may make it a bit
| harder for security to monitor these groups (no dragnets), but
| if they are mass groups it won 't be hard to infiltrate
| anyways. If a member of the public can get in then why can't
| someone from the CIA/NSA? It might as well be in clear text. If
| they can't infiltrate these groups then we have much bigger
| problems and everyone has been overestimating the power of
| these organizations for decades.
|
| So to sum up. I highly value privacy and security (especially
| as we're adding more to the internet. The danger is
| increasing). But I'm against extremism. It is a numbers game
| that more public members will gain value from privacy than the
| dozens of terrorists who will. But it is a different situation
| if someone creates a space _dedicated_ to extremism.
|
| (I do think this is a very reasonable question to ask though)
|
| Edit: I wouldn't say that Signal will be completely
| unmoderated. Groups still have admins. But you're right that
| Signal won't be able to moderate. But this isn't that different
| from any federated platform.
| jolmg wrote:
| I'm not sure of my own position, but I think the fundamental
| moral difference for those supporting moderation is that if one
| _does_ have the ability to moderate, then they _should_ have a
| moral obligation to do so. Technically, there 's no central
| authority that can moderate Signal, so you can't have the moral
| obligation there.
|
| I don't think there would be a significant proportion of people
| that would advocate for Signal to become centralized so it
| would allow moderation by a central authority.
|
| Another perhaps more cynical take is that even if there is
| hate-speech and other undesirable communication in Signal, it's
| not seen so people aren't concerned about it. As they say, "out
| of sight, out of mind." That makes me wonder if expectations
| would change if people started publishing screenshots of Signal
| groups with hate-speech. I think they'd be pretty limited to
| small sizes, so perhaps they wouldn't be as concerning.
| phlakaton wrote:
| As Signal has allegedly seen a huge boost in signups since Jan
| 6, I think this is a very pertinent and difficult question.
|
| The way I see it, Signal will not make it any easier for
| outsiders to get radicalized (there's no public forum aspect),
| but once people are already radicalized and connected, it can
| be used to great mischief. That said, I tend to be liberal on
| this topic, and I feel the benefits of across-the-board E2E
| encryption to society outweigh the risks. But it seems likely
| to me that that principle is about to be sorely tested.
| ip26 wrote:
| Parler is broadcast, Signal is point to point. It's a
| significant difference.
| godelski wrote:
| Doesn't Telegram have broadcast (channels)? And isn't this a
| highly requested feature for Signal? This seems to be what
| will happen to any communication network unless restricted
| significantly.
| Natfan wrote:
| Can't speak for Signal, but Telegram does have broadcasting
| via Channles. For example, I get a developer-friendly memes
| by @dev_meme
| ip26 wrote:
| They do- and Telegram has been shutting down channels for
| incitement of violence since at least 2015
|
| https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/paris-terror-
| attacks/secre...
| [deleted]
| mcint wrote:
| The existing platforms work well enough for people who aren't
| kicked off of them, or hindered in sharing their views. Liking,
| caring about, or knowing of the existence of these new
| platforms is a strong proxy for the kinds of political views
| that some find easy and safe to hate on.
|
| Engagement inside Signal is with your existing networks and
| groups, and can only grow iteratively--not
| virally/exponentially--it's a chat app. WhatsApp and Telegram
| do support and encourage broadcast oriented communication, and
| personally I do associate WhatsApp with misinformation-fueled
| violence in countries where it's the first exposure people have
| to internet-style mass direct communication.
|
| Signal invented new cryptography to justify its existence.
| WhatsApp scaled chat, SMS-analogous to start, for the world to
| use. Telegram invented secret ways to MitM chat connections,
| and wasn't under US influence. Parler exists to make a
| political statement in the current US political context.
| throwaway829 wrote:
| Parler has right wing users. Telegram has not been labeled
| right wing. That's the difference.
| anderber wrote:
| This is not true, Parler was actively trying to be right wing
| and saying they're just about free speech. Their moderation
| says otherwise.
| eplanit wrote:
| Twitter claims to be neutral but their moderation reveals
| their active left-bias.
| berkes wrote:
| Without backup or evidence, that sounds like a very
| populist thing to say.
|
| Makes me wonder if with data, math and statistics 'right'
| or 'left' can be distinguished at all: since they are so
| ambiguous and fluid concepts.
| [deleted]
| anderber wrote:
| From my point of view, the conversation is more about
| supporting privacy vs not. I don't think anyone is supporting
| WhatsApp, specially after the recent news.
| jolmg wrote:
| I think for the sake of shireboy's question, WhatsApp can be
| ignored.
|
| shireboy's point seems to be that it seems inconsistent to
| want moderation in one type of network and not mind not
| having it in the other. Though, it's possible that the users
| supporting the moderation are different than those supporting
| e2e networks.
| CalChris wrote:
| It's interesting to look open Signal and see a steady influx of
| my contacts show up as new users.
| b0tch7 wrote:
| Question for you smart people:
|
| I don't have a FB Profile hence don't have the FB App nor FB
| Messenger, but I do use whatsapp extensively. Do I need to be
| overly concerned with whatsapp's privacy changes?
| dlojudice wrote:
| I tried to migrate a busy group of friends from Whatsapp to
| Signal but a few lock-ins emerged:
|
| - stickers (big one!) - if it was possible to import whatsapp
| stickers library it would be a big win
|
| - on whatsapp it's easier to share news and memes from other
| groups - network effect
|
| - UX/UI - whatsapp seems to have a much tailored UI for beginners
| another_kel wrote:
| FYI: Telegram checks all these boxes.
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| No end-to-end encryption though. It's optional for direct
| messages and nonexistent for group chats.
| suyash wrote:
| Is there a GitHub issue or someone to make this as a feature
| request for Signal since it's an open source project? +1 to
| easy migration features that can allow folks and groups to move
| from WhatsApp to Signal.
| Daniel_sk wrote:
| https://community.signalusers.org/c/feature-requests
| [deleted]
| hiq wrote:
| > - UX/UI - whatsapp seems to have a much tailored UI for
| beginners
|
| How so? UX/UI for beginners is a big priority for Signal, your
| feedback could be helpful.
|
| I might agree with you for Signal-Desktop: installing another
| application is always more friction, and it will get out of
| sync if you don't open it regularly, which doesn't happen with
| WA since the messages are retrieved from the phone.
| Klonoar wrote:
| At least for Telegram, there are sub-groups out there that port
| stickers from other services (e.g, LINE). Hard to imagine that
| won't crop up for Signal eventually, if not already.
| gen3 wrote:
| I found a bunch of sticker packs here that were easy to
| install. There must be a way to import telegram sticker packs,
| because I see them referenced. https://signalstickers.com
| rho4 wrote:
| To me signal is like the new charging standard or version control
| system to rule them all: I am now forced to juggle (n + 1)
| versions in my life.
|
| And no web client means I am forced to type on my mobile (ugh),
| and I cannot mitigate the hurt with Franz.
| hans1729 wrote:
| fwiw, signal has a decent client for macos
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| They have a desktop client. It's very basic though.
| djsumdog wrote:
| I connected Singal the other day to my Matrix server via a
| bridge:
|
| https://battlepenguin.com/tech/matrix-one-chat-protocol-to-r...
|
| I currently have Hangouts/Messenger/Telegram and Signal all
| connected via bridges to Matrix. I pump all my
| Facebook/Messenger/Hangouts traffic in my browser through a VPN
| to the server where the bridges are hosted so Google/Messenger
| won't flag them for security.
|
| This took a couple of tries of logging in outside of the proxy to
| FB, getting the security warning and then switching back to the
| proxy with the same cookies so FB/Google algos learn the IP is
| safe. Hopefully when I move, if I keep all those same rules in
| place (using FoxyProxy for Firefox or Chrome-based browsers) and
| turning off location on my Android device permanently (will also
| move to a PinePhone soon), I can make it difficult for Google/FB
| to know my location after I move from my current city.
|
| Singal and Telegram are great because they have standard APIs
| that make it easy for a Matrix Bridge. For FB and Google I have
| to trick them, which makes them hostile to developers and tech
| people. We've had to do this for years with libpurple plugins as
| well:
|
| https://battlepenguin.com/tech/there-is-an-ios-device-attach...
| jypepin wrote:
| I have a few family-related whatsapp groups and I've been
| thinking about asking/moving those groups to signal, but I really
| can't imagine my parents/sister/friends to understand, nor care
| about the facebook data issue. After all, they're all on Facebook
| and all use it.
|
| I don't think I'll ever get to request it, because I'm pretty
| sure it's going to fail, especially with my parents and other
| from this age group - having them download another app, signup,
| etc. will be too complicated.
|
| My family group is all iphone users, so I thought about moving
| this to iMessage, which feels more possible, but again, I'm not
| even sure my parents understand the difference between whatsapp
| and iMessage, as they send me messages on both platform without
| much logic.
|
| Like everything else "bad" that happens to Facebook, this event
| won't change much and impact on whatsapp will, unfortunately, not
| change anything.
|
| Remember when corporates stopped advertising on Facebook? They're
| all back.
| baxtr wrote:
| Some ideas:
|
| 1. Install the app when you visit, go to the process together
| (difficult these days, I know...)
|
| 2. If you have many iPhone users in your family, answer on
| iMessage whenever they send you a WhatsApp. This way you can
| pull them over slowly
|
| 3. If Android users send you a WhatsApp, check if they have
| Signal installed and answer there instead.
|
| It is "Salami tactics", but works for me.
| annadane wrote:
| I don't like "nothing will happen" as a talking point. "Nothing
| will happen" because... they cornered the market. They're the
| only game in town. It's the only way for many people to contact
| their friends. It's not their fault Facebook is a scummy
| organization run by a sociopath, they don't really have any
| options. I don't like this implication that the public is to
| blame
| bondarchuk wrote:
| They all moved to whatsapp one time too, I don't think Signal
| is any more difficult right?
| multjoy wrote:
| For the vast majority of people, WhatsApp works just fine;
| you're trying to get them off something they're comfortable
| with rather than getting them to use something better than
| SMS.
| gegtik wrote:
| my 67 year old mother in law switched from whatsapp to signal
| and told me about it unbidden. its happening.
| tapoxi wrote:
| > I don't think I'll ever get to request it, because I'm pretty
| sure it's going to fail, especially with my parents and other
| from this age group - having them download another app, signup,
| etc. will be too complicated.
|
| I moved my whole family to Signal, and its surprisingly easy.
| It asks for their phone number, name (it's autocompleted) and a
| pin. You can create a link to your family's group chat so then
| can join without needing someone to invite them.
| jsmcgd wrote:
| I'm in the process of moving family and friends. For my
| friends who I believe are more than capable of moving, I just
| said them that I'm leaving WhatsApp, you can still reach me
| on Signal. Then I block them on WhatsApp, so I don't relapse.
| Almost all of them have moved across so far. I installed
| Signal for my mom and then blocked my myself on WhatsApp on
| her phone, so she's forced to use Signal to contact me. If
| someone can use WhatsApp they can definitely use Signal. It's
| more secure and it's cleaner.
| thinkloop wrote:
| > Then I block them on WhatsApp, so I don't relapse
|
| That's the key move, it takes guts
| Sodman wrote:
| Most people's whole family is already using WhatsApp to
| communicate amongst themselves, especially outside the US.
| It's not that signal is any harder to use, it's that you now
| need everyone to unlearn their "Use WhatsApp" behavior, and
| the only justifications you can give them is
| "Facebook/Privacy!".
|
| This might work with younger groups who really care about
| that stuff, but as you move up the age groups you'll start to
| find people who think "Well I already use Facebook daily, how
| is this different? Why should I care?", and eventually hit
| the age group that doesn't know the difference between SMS
| and WhatsApp, they're all just "messages".
|
| Obviously I'm over-generalizing a bit here, but even if I got
| my parents using Signal, they'd still use WhatsApp to talk to
| their friends. My parents' parents are even more locked in.
| Short of charging a monthly fee, I don't think there's
| anything WhatsApp could do that will get a majority of folks
| to actually uninstall it.
| alperakgun wrote:
| I can't get started with Signal for the last few days.
|
| It rejects the correct SMS confirmation code it's
| sending/receiving itself :)
| prophesi wrote:
| I doubt you're actually having this problem, but if you are,
| you can add an issue to the corresponding Android/iOS repo.
| skyspor wrote:
| They had announced capacity issues with SMS service due to
| onboarding a massive number of new users.
| prophesi wrote:
| That resulted in delays, not incorrect codes.
| jandrese wrote:
| Maybe the code was taking so long to get through that it
| was expiring?
|
| At any rate, I know a couple of people who have recently
| signed up so it's not affecting everybody.
| the_pwner224 wrote:
| You could try removing the SMS permission from the app, and
| just type the code into Signal manually once you get the SMS
| with the code.
| temporaryacc1 wrote:
| All things equal, it's good in itself to diversify geographically
| your portfolio of apps. Signal is in Silicon Valley, Telegram is
| in Dubai, so I go for Telegram.
| dbg31415 wrote:
| I really want to like Signal, just... it's so shitty at times.
|
| Discord and Slack are great. Even Microsoft Teams.
|
| Shitty things about Signal:
|
| 1) When you set "Disappearing Messages" it's for any messages
| that come in after that point. I think it should be for the whole
| thread. Even though the UX implies it's for the entire
| conversation, it's really just for messages sent after the
| setting was changed. Moreover... let's say you change the
| settings a few times... you have no idea if / when individual
| messages will disappear.
|
| 2) When you delete a message on your phone, it's still on your
| desktop -- and everyone else's devices. It's really frustrating
| that if I send a typo, I can't delete it or fix it. Worse, it
| appears to delete... and being native to Discord / Slack /
| Teams... I expect it to delete for everyone. They did change
| message text from "Delete" to "Delete message for me" but even
| that doesn't even delete across all my devices.
|
| 3) You can't edit messages after you send them.
|
| 4) Functionality is different on a phone vs a desktop. You can't
| do nearly as much on the desktop version.
|
| 5) It's funky when you change phones. You can't like sync all
| your old messages from one device to another. It'll pull them on
| to a Desktop client, but it won't pull them into a new Mobile
| phone client. Dunno, just bad UX.
|
| 6) Signal is still based on phone numbers... I don't trust phone
| number based 2FA, so I don't really trust Signal to be based on
| phone numbers either.
|
| But it's not all bad! Some things they added which make it feel
| less horrible... they finally did add meta data previews for
| URLs. That was nice. They added ability to give tapbacks / emjoi
| responses, and "reply" to messages. I think all this in the last
| year or so. They're working on it... but like it still feels like
| they're aiming for shitty old cell phone text messages as what
| they are trying to replace... I wish they were aiming for Discord
| / Slack / Teams as those platforms have really done a great job
| with chat.
|
| By far, the platform with the most improvement was Microsoft
| Teams. They had this wonky Skype For Business who knows hybrid
| approach. And they had a lot of the same issues around messages
| not being synced between devices. They fixed that in the last 18
| months. I've been using Signal since Snowden, but in my opinion
| Signal still has a long way to go before it's something I would
| actually want to use to chat with friends.
| hiq wrote:
| > 1) ... you have no idea if / when individual messages will
| disappear.
|
| There's a small clock between the sending date and the (double)
| tick which indicates just that.
|
| Also, I think it's recent, but if you select a message then
| click the 'i' (information) at the top there's a countdown that
| says exactly in how much time it disappears.
|
| > 4) Functionality is different on a phone vs a desktop. You
| can't do nearly as much on the desktop version.
|
| Which features are you missing on the desktop version? They
| seem to have implemented calls recently, I'm not sure what's
| still missing. I mostly write text messages though, so I
| wouldn't know.
|
| > 5) It's funky when you change phones. You can't like sync all
| your old messages from one device to another. It'll pull them
| on to a Desktop client, but it won't pull them into a new
| Mobile phone client. Dunno, just bad UX.
|
| Is it better with e.g. WhatsApp? You have to transfer the
| backup files anyway, right? If you're on Android it should boil
| down to transferring the backup files, just like with WhatsApp.
| It does suck on iOS from what I've read.
|
| > 6) Signal is still based on phone numbers... I don't trust
| phone number based 2FA, so I don't really trust Signal to be
| based on phone numbers either.
|
| Phone numbers are a problem, but they're on a good track to get
| rid of them while still providing the same privacy. In the
| meantime, I don't think it's a security risk if you have a
| random pin.
|
| If you compare Signal with Discord, Slack and Microsoft Teams,
| Signal will never win on features. AFAIK these are not E2EE and
| they don't really try to reduce the metadata or even data known
| by the servers. Basically a feature vs. security trade-off.
| dbg31415 wrote:
| > There's a small clock between the sending date and the
| (double) tick which indicates just that.
|
| Cool, I see it now. But there's still no way to change it. In
| Snapchat, when I set the time it impacts all messages in the
| conversation. It'd be nice to have the timer impact all
| messages in the conversation, it's weird how it is set at the
| conversation level but doesn't apply to all messages in that
| conversation.
|
| > Which features are you missing on the desktop version?
|
| Create new group. Invite friends. Change your avatar.
| Literally had to text myself a picture so I could use it as
| my avatar. Oof. Windows Desktop version vs iOS app version.
| MacOS version I dont't think is any better.
|
| Found another annoying thing... two actually. "Mark as
| unread" is device specific, not message specific. Also under
| the little info on each message there's a button "Delete
| Message" but again it's not a real delete, it just impacts
| the device -- all the other places they said, "Delete message
| for me" so they know it's confusing to just say "Delete" and
| not have it actually delete the message for everyone.
|
| > It does suck on iOS from what I've read.
|
| Good it works better on other platforms, but yeah it really
| sucks on iOS. Get a new phone, and you have to be re-added to
| groups.
|
| > If you compare Signal with Discord, Slack and Microsoft
| Teams, Signal will never win on features.
|
| Why? Doesn't seem like it'd be impossible to sync all
| messages across all devices. Doesn't seem like it'd be hard
| to allow for deletion of sent messages. It's not peer-to-
| peer, and they keep all the messages on the server... when
| you turn on Signal Desktop it goes and retrieves the messages
| for you going back quite a ways. They just need to sync
| between devices.
| renewiltord wrote:
| My mum and dad (in their 60s) asked us to move from WhatsApp.
| They did all the work (setting up the groups and everything). I
| just chatted.
| vinay427 wrote:
| I love that Signal generally seems receptive to features that
| users ask for. It's far from perfect, as there are certain
| features I've seen repeatedly requested that are still yet to be
| implemented, but over the years that I've used it, Signal has
| come much closer to a full-featured WhatsApp alternative while
| taking the harder path of maintaining privacy for these
| additions.
|
| My personal wishlist:
|
| - Making the app available on F-Droid, either on the official
| repos or just hosting a third-party one
|
| - Bringing the Android backup solution (encrypted blob) to iOS
|
| - Bringing the iOS backup solution (direct device transfer over
| Wi-Fi) to Android
|
| - Signup with usernames/emails as an option instead of only
| verified phone numbers
|
| - A more reliable desktop client, because most of my contacts on
| Signal (myself included) have experienced syncing issues, message
| decryption issues, notification issues, etc. I do like that the
| desktop client is temporarily standalone in that the phone
| running the app does not need to be available, although I have
| had to re-connect the two every once in a while so I don't find
| it reassuring to depend on the desktop client alone.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| There is bad blood between F-Droid and the Signal devs. I don't
| expect the app to ever appear on F-Droid. Signal's developers
| are on record as preferring the Google Play store as the
| official distribution method, and even downloading the APK
| directly from the Signal website is something they tolerate
| only grudgingly.
|
| Plus, some are predicting that forthcoming changes to Android -
| Google possibly mainstreaming its "advanced protection" model
| so that phone owners cannot install the F-Droid APK except
| through enabling ADB and pushing it to the phone from a
| computer over the command line - will further marginalize
| F-Droid.
| sliken wrote:
| Not sure about today, but didn't f-droid sign all apps with
| an f-droid key, meaning you have to trust f-droid instead of
| Whisper systems?
|
| From a security point of view it seems quite reasonable to
| object to f-droid handling all signatures.
| codethief wrote:
| Exactly, that was the reason Moxie gave for wanting to
| avoid F-Droid back in the day. Besides, I hear the .apk one
| can obtain from signal.org these days comes with an
| integrated update mechanism, anyway? As much as I am a fan
| of F-Droid, I really don't understand the criticism here.
| What advantages does F-Droid provide here?
| hiq wrote:
| If you browse the F-Droid website they actually mention
| that it's possible to use the .apk distributed by the
| developers, if the apk is reproducible. It's cumbersome and
| requires a lot of goodwill from both the developers and the
| F-Droid maintainers, but it's not impossible.
|
| The thing is, people using F-Droid are most likely already
| aware that they can install the .apk directly from
| https://signal.org/android/apk/ so there's not much to gain
| (the .apk prompts the user when an update is available
| too).
| suyash wrote:
| Here is how I rate them now:
|
| 1. Worst Offender : Facebook Messenger --> spyware for tracking
| all your activities even in background
|
| 2. WhatsApp : Lost trust in it since Facebook bought it, more so
| with the new terms and conditions. Data is not safe anymore.
|
| 3. Telegram : Trust it's privacy but it's proposed business model
| is also advertisement based so avoiding it.
|
| 4. Signal : Best option, there are some sacrifices to be made
| with lack of contacts and some features but slowly and surely we
| can turn the tide. Also it's open source funded by a Non-Profit
| so that gets it bonus points.
|
| Reference: https://9to5mac.com/2021/01/04/app-privacy-labels-
| messaging-...
| querez wrote:
| you're missing Threema
| dunefox wrote:
| Threema costs money which is a no go for almost everybody.
| greatpatton wrote:
| And then people complain to be the product...
| dunefox wrote:
| Not even that most of the time. People just don't really
| notice or care.
| jorvi wrote:
| WhatsApp became massive before being bought by Facebook and
| you had to purchase it for $0.99 (or $2,99 it's been almost
| a decade so I can't remember the exact price). So no, as
| long as the network effect is there, costing money is not a
| no-go.
| dunefox wrote:
| I can only tell you what I have heard from many people
| myself: 4EUR for a chat app is not on.
| mikece wrote:
| Even better is Wire: no phone number required, doesn't access
| your contacts, free personal accounts available, you can use it
| on a desktop machine with nothing more than a web browser, when
| using an installed app you can be logged into three Wire
| accounts at the same time, source code is open source and has
| been audited for security, you can set up your own locally
| hosted (or in your own cloud)... and more I'm probably
| forgetting.
| webmobdev wrote:
| Only client is opensource right? If I remember right, the
| server code isn't opensource.
| rekoros wrote:
| It isn't open source in the sense that it's in Haskell,
| meaning it's encrypted :-)
|
| Otherwise it's totally open source:
| https://github.com/wireapp/wire-server
| deepstack wrote:
| Thank you for mention this! I don't know why Wire is not
| mentioned in thread like this. It is best without meta data
| collection (such as phone number). You can register with just
| an email and it is based on the encryption protocol that
| Signal uses. On top of that, the server is written in
| Haskell!!! Yes, Signal server is in Java, btw. Which is not
| bad. And Wire is based in Switzerland, with GDPR in Europe it
| has better data privacy jurisdictions.
| 1_player wrote:
| The fact that it's a "secure collaboration platform" means it
| doesn't fill the same niche. I don't need a secure
| collaboration platform to talk with my family or friends.
|
| Also, no mention of free personal accounts here:
| https://wire.com/en/pricing/
|
| And phone ID required is a plus. I don't need people to log
| in or search for contacts. Just install and boom, we're
| connected.
| zepearl wrote:
| I'd just like to mention that Matrix (and its most prominent
| client "Element") sounds similar:
|
| > _Even better is Wire: no phone number required, doesn 't
| access your contacts, free personal accounts available, you
| can use it on a desktop machine with nothing more than a web
| browser_
|
| Same
|
| > _when using an installed app you can be logged into three
| Wire accounts at the same time_
|
| Don't know if that's possible with one of the currently
| existing Matrix-clients. I guess that maybe in the future
| that would be possible, respectively, doesn't sound too
| difficult to implement.
|
| > _is open source and has been audited for security, you can
| set up your own locally hosted (or in your own cloud)_
|
| Same for Matrix. Not sure about the official audit, but at
| least France decided to use it as a base for its own
| governmental chat (
| https://matrix.org/blog/2018/04/26/matrix-and-riot-
| confirmed... ) so I guess/hope that they audited the original
| software.
| arnoooooo wrote:
| What about Element / Matrix ? It's ahead of Signal in
| usability, and much more future-proof.
| johnchristopher wrote:
| > What about Element / Matrix ? It's ahead of Signal in
| usability, and much more future-proof.
|
| If only it could be present-ready.
|
| No, I am kidding :).
|
| The way I see it Matrix and Signal have different short term
| and long term goals, some overlapping. And both could do way
| better in term of usability.
| kevincox wrote:
| > It's ahead of Signal in usability
|
| I like and use Element but it definitely isn't ahead in
| usability. Getting e2e set up for "average" people isn't
| trivial. Especially if they have multiple devices.
|
| That being said it is the the best long term option in my
| opinion and I am donating to the organization. Hopefully they
| can work on polishing the e2e UX.
| mike-cardwell wrote:
| Encryption in Matrix is shit, and is making me feel foolish
| about inviting various friends onto Matrix.
|
| I set up my own server using Synapse, and invited about
| half a dozen other IRL techie friends to join me in there
| to continue chatting during Covid times.
|
| Considering we've all worked in tech for decades and run
| our own servers/services, none of us can really work out
| how the hell it's supposed to work. I mean, after lots of
| time consuming verifying of devices it kind of works.
| Except recently, all of a sudden, one of the people in our
| main chat room can not see the messages I sent from one of
| my devices. It tells him to get my keys from another
| session, he has only every used a single device/session.
| There is no UI that either of us can find to help fix it.
| We can chat fine in a different encrypted room, or if I use
| a different device.
|
| I'm not pulling anyone else into the Matrix ecosystem until
| encryption stops being just so god damn awful.
| spurgu wrote:
| This I've experienced as well, plus various UI/UX
| glitches and inconsistencies. It's getting _slowly_
| better though it seems.
| djsumdog wrote:
| The web UI use to ask you for your encryption password,
| but that seems to have disappeared recently.
| kevincox wrote:
| Do you mean the UX of the encryption or the privacy
| guarantees?
| mike-cardwell wrote:
| The UX. I assume it functions well technically, as they
| don't seem to have made any compromises to make it easy
| to use.
| zepearl wrote:
| > _Getting e2e set up_
|
| Do you mean about accessing an encrypted chat from multiple
| devices?
|
| If yes, I was playing with that just this weekend and I did
| not understand at all how to trust the other devices by
| using "text" (which "text"? I didn't get anything to
| type/check/approve anywhere); on the other hand by using
| the option to use emoji (compare a series of emoji between
| devices and then confirm) was very simple.
|
| As well finding the link to a group-chat that I just
| created was not simple (or at least the place where to find
| it was not obvious).
|
| > _That being said it is the the best long term option in
| my opinion and I am donating to the organization. Hopefully
| they can work on polishing the e2e UX._
|
| Same here & I agree.
| kevincox wrote:
| For me the verify by text worked, but you can click on a
| lot of very similar places and you get different results.
| For example if you click verify it forces interactive
| verification. If you click the sessions and then click a
| session you can verify individual sessions. Of course you
| can't non-interactively verify a users main key.
|
| I'm also confused why each device is handled separately.
| I would rather I just share a key around (and ideally it
| rotates occasionally) and not share what and how many
| devices I have and what one I am using at the moment.
| zepearl wrote:
| > _but you can click on a lot of very similar places and
| you get different results._
|
| Aha, didn't notice that, thx!
|
| > _I 'm also confused why each device is handled
| separately._
|
| Well, I can understand it more or less (I guess kind of
| similar to confirming in Whatsapp your multiple open
| sessions on different devices, to ensure that nobody is
| using something that you forgot/left behind?), but doing
| it this way is quite hardcore - on the other hand it
| could be that the whole thing is deeply embedded in the
| software's encryption principles/guidelines => it would
| probably still be ok, but it needs to be explained
| better, be more clearly accessible.
|
| I guess that having a rotating key (with the software
| asking from time to time "do you want to accept key
| jf8k4d9k?") would probably be confusing for non-technical
| users and would probably generate
| uncertainty/anxiety/etc... ?
| kevincox wrote:
| Losing the device is an interesting point. However I
| think due to the way that cross signing works they could
| use that device to sign new sessions anyways. They would
| also have access to key backups so I don't think that
| case is supported well right now.
|
| For the rotating key it would be automatically signed by
| the previous key or master key so no user-visible change
| would be shown.
| fractionalhare wrote:
| Why is it more future-proof?
| Evidlo wrote:
| I'm guessing the federated aspect. You can jump ship to
| another server and not break your social graph.
|
| Also you can use alternative clients, which (I think) is
| against Signal's TOS, and is at least discouraged.
| eclipseo76 wrote:
| I use Signal and Matrix with different usecases, Matrix being
| more a replacement for IRC and Signal for communicating with
| friends.
| Triv888 wrote:
| I wish that they would have chosen a different name when
| switching from Riot to Element because I am just starting to
| getting used to it. But it is still my #1 option.
| Evidlo wrote:
| It's not really any less generic than Signal, though.
| Neither are great names.
| zanny wrote:
| Signal and Telegram at least have something to do with
| communication, Element probably makes most people think
| about rocks.
| akvadrako wrote:
| I think Element is way behind Signal in terms of usability.
| The iOS app is the most confusing chat app I've seen,
| especially if you are using your own servers.
| rvz wrote:
| Exactly. Very bad name, too techy for the average folk and it
| doesn't have the same network effect as Signal or Telegram. I
| disagree that it is ahead of Signal for usability in fact it
| is still behind.
|
| Although I do praise it for not requiring and collecting my
| phone number and being a bit more future-proof and
| decentralised, unlike Signal and Telegram.
|
| But in terms of getting my friends grandmother over it, it
| completely loses on usability and its name is so confusing to
| them you just _had_ to also mention the Matrix protocol, when
| it is just _Element._ which even that by itself is very
| ambiguous.
| zamadatix wrote:
| Matrix feels akin to trying to tell my (non technical)
| friends that they should use HTTPS as their social media
| site. I think it's technically more capable but trying to
| explain what you can do, how to get started, or why it's
| better is a much higher bar than something like Signal.
| zepearl wrote:
| Absolutely correct, I just did that this weekend: big
| effort trying to explain all pros vs cons and the its
| technical background and future outlook, prepared test
| chatroom, wrote simple instructions to create account and
| try it out => got ignored, failed miserably, hehe :)
| brabel wrote:
| Don't you consider Keybase to be an option as well?
|
| https://keybase.io
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Keybase is effectively in maintenance mode after being
| acquihired by Zoom.
|
| If anything, Signal should adopt some of the crypto identity
| primitives Keybase was known for [1] for persona management
| that builds on (but still supports) phone DID identifiers.
| Would Zoom sell or donate Keybase infra to Signal Foundation?
| That'd be swank.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keybase
| spurgu wrote:
| Even calling it "maintenance mode" is a bit too generous.
| It's effectively abandoned. Which is a shame, I really
| liked it and its various features.
| pastorhudson wrote:
| I tried signal, matrix, Riot, Slack, Discord, Messenger,
| Hangouts, and Keybase is by far the best option.
|
| It is in an uncertain place though since Zoom bought them and
| moved its developers to work on Zoom. There has only been one
| small update to Keybase since zoom purchased them.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| While it's not getting updated I don't have any worries
| about the reliability of its existing security. It's not
| perfect but it's pretty mature and feature-rich.
| tracedddd wrote:
| Keybase showed a lot of promise, but ever since they were
| bought by Zoom I've been hesitant to depend on it. There's a
| good chance it'll be neglected or cannibalized in the future,
| not to mention the real or imagined CCP influence. Perhaps
| failure is a self fulfilling prophecy.
| windexh8er wrote:
| I've been a Keybase user for a couple years now. I started
| using Signal when it was TextSecure. From Signal Insights 98%
| of my conversations are encrypted because I pushed Signal
| hard on friends, family and colleagues early on. I talk to
| one person on Keybase that refuses to use Signal (not exactly
| sure their rationale anymore). For some reason I thought
| Keybase was going to give me the early experience of Twitter,
| where I was able to interact with people in the same field
| without having to know them IRL. And while Keybase does
| recommend I follow / interact with some of those people it
| feels less attainable to start up a random conversation or
| jump into a public thread like I did early on with Twitter.
| To be clear I'm not saying that's Keybase's fault. As for
| getting non-technical family and friends using Keybase,
| well... I find that it's not as approachable. I think it is
| more convenient in some cases (chat history is probably the
| #1 item), but it's also clearly geared towards people who
| likely have an idea what PGP is (re: PGP key identity proof,
| etc). I wish there was something that mashed up the best of
| Signal, Keybase and Twitter. But at the end of the day I'd
| probably still use Signal for the majority of direct person
| to person messaging because of the time and personal effort
| I've put into getting my circle to use it. The switching cost
| is too high a bar now to consider anything unless it's
| exponentially better (and I don't think that exists). I also
| really don't like the fact that Zoom owns Keybase and can't
| see myself recommending it much moving forward over
| alternatives like Element.
| laurent92 wrote:
| All of them: _Require_ your phone number to work, and ask for
| your full address book.
|
| Asking repeatedly for information that is not necessary is a
| red flag. It is suspicious, to say the least, that Signal is
| not censored from Apple's Appstore.
| webmobdev wrote:
| And that's why I recommend Jami - https://jami.net/ - you
| don't even need to share your phone number or email id to use
| it.
| ArnoVW wrote:
| I believe the important distinction is between 'having access
| to phonebook for calls and chats' and 'datamining phonebook
| for the needs of Facebook'.
|
| Signal (the foundation) does not get to use my phonebook even
| if Signal (the app) does.
|
| Made the switch yesterday. Hope this will be a turning point
| for Facebook
| winrid wrote:
| Wait, how does FB Messenger track your browsing or purchase
| history? Is it tracking that history outside of the app??
| sorenjan wrote:
| How is Signal going to fund their operations in the future if
| they grow to anything close to the other three in size?
| Donations? Even if they're a non-profit they still need to keep
| the servers running.
| _Understated_ wrote:
| Maybe the same way that WhatsApp did: $1 per year per person.
| codethief wrote:
| The Signal Foundation received a zero-interest loan of
| $100,000,000 by WhatsApp founder Brian Acton which doesn't
| need to be paid back until the year 2068 or something.
| [deleted]
| webmobdev wrote:
| Consider Jami - https://jami.net/ too - you don't even need to
| share your phone number or email id to use it.
|
| And it has support for nearly all desktop and mobile platforms
| (with all the features we expect from a messaging client, and
| more - it is also a SIP client). It is fully open source, and
| all data is stored on your device.
|
| Signal may be run by a non-profit, but it a non-profit based in
| the United States. _In the US, a non-profit can also be
| converted into a for-profit business._
| davidf560 wrote:
| I've played with Jami several times because it sounds good on
| paper but it just flat out failed to work a lot of the time.
| Messages sent but never received, no indication of why or
| what was going on. For my uses anyway, IM needs to be above
| all reliable - when I send a message I need to know the
| recipient will get it (and in a timely manner, modulo their
| availability).
|
| Most of my network is on Telegram at my urging because it was
| the best option at the time, but I'm constantly looking for
| something better to replace it (as I'm aware of the downsides
| to Telegram). Currently I'm trialing Element with one of my
| contacts and I'd say it might be ready if I can get past the
| initial setup headaches, but Telegram just works so darn well
| and is so amazingly fast that it will be very hard to get
| buy-in for people to switch. Most people are overloaded with
| IM apps already, adding another one is tough unless it can
| completely replace and deprecate one they're already using.
| Jami definitely is not that IMO.
| kees99 wrote:
| Another of those "good on paper" IM apps: Delta Chat -
| fully standards-compliant (SMTP, IMAP, Autocrypt),
| federated _and_ doesn 't require you to set up your own
| server (just use your existing mail provider). Fantastic
| idea!
|
| ...well, until you try bring over your non-techie friends
| who set it up with some freemail account, where app starts
| triggering anti-abuse, then throttle, then lock the whole
| account out.
| 88840-8855 wrote:
| i have tried Jami before and was very disappointed by the bad
| UX.
|
| People use Telegram, because it has a fantastic UX and UI.
|
| If you want people to even considering switching from
| WhatsApp, then the alternative must be 120% polished.
| btashton wrote:
| The contacts bit is a disaster right now, there is a whole
| support page devoted to it and it still does not tell the whole
| story. https://support.signal.org/hc/en-
| us/articles/360007319011-Ma...
|
| I had a contact show up with a super old name that I wanted to
| update but it was right in all my other apps. Turns out I still
| had the old name in one of the read only merged contacts from
| WhatsApp (contact showed up fine in WhatsApp). I had to remove
| my WhatsApp account clear the app data for signal and resync
| everything.
| CalChris wrote:
| Signal is _quite_ good and I use it for person to person.
| Hopefully with an influx of new users and with that, funding,
| it can reach feature parity with WhatsApp which is currently
| much better for groups. WhatsApp and Uber and Lyft etc, are
| very well crafted applications on iOS. They feel magical.
| Signal can get there as well, but it will take funding+effort.
| johnchristopher wrote:
| I see the opinion that more users will help make Signal reach
| feature parity but I don't understand why that follows.
| Unless there is a massive increase in donations but that is
| largely covered by the 0% interest rate funding from WA
| founder.
| 1_player wrote:
| While not a guarantee, the number of donations is
| proportional to the number of users. Since they can't
| extort their current users for more money, the only hope
| for Signal is to get more users.
| codethief wrote:
| > 3. Telegram : Trust it's privacy
|
| How come you trust its privacy? Its privacy guarantees are by
| far worse than those of WhatsApp as Telegram messages aren't
| even end-to-end encrypted by default.
| Angostura wrote:
| I rate them differently- I can use Facebook and supply minimal
| real personal information. WhatsApp by contrast demands full
| access to all my contacts whether they use WhatsApp or not
| Daniel_sk wrote:
| You don't need to give permissions to contacts, you can add a
| contact manually in WhatsApp.
| beagle3 wrote:
| That has not been true in forever on either iOS or Android,
| if it ever was.
|
| It is possible to reply to numbers bot listed in your
| contacts; and apparently it is possible to initiate chats
| with numbers by using a web api which triggers a platform
| specific app action.
|
| But you'd be left with phone numbers as identifiers, and at
| most the user's self description which is sometimes they
| name and sometimes just something like "xxx"
| notjes wrote:
| What is the business model of Signal? How are they paying their
| bills?
| jliptzin wrote:
| Donations
| anaclet0 wrote:
| Donations
| noisenotsignal wrote:
| They are a non-profit, so they're funded by grants and
| donations.
| Daniel_sk wrote:
| I moved 10 of my non-IT (male, age ~30-35) friends from FB
| Messenger group chat to Signal. None of them had any problems
| setting it up, none had any questions during the setup. I just
| invited them to the group after they created accounts (you can
| also use an invitation link) and the chat continued on Signal. No
| one has looked back at FB Messenger and we are not missing any
| functionality. I am slowly spreading in my circles and so far
| with only positive feedback.
| bouncing wrote:
| The problem is, you have to "be that guy."
| Daniel_sk wrote:
| I have to. But in this case it's not a social network, I
| don't care if the rest of world uses WhatsApp. I don't need a
| "network effect". I am fine when the people around me use it.
| So I achieved my personal goal and while I am happy if more
| people will join, it will not impact my own usage.
| afterburner wrote:
| He means you have to be "that guy" that people actually
| listen to and would switch apps for.
| dpoochieni wrote:
| Well, if no one listens to you why even make the effort
| to keep in touch. That's a different problem and solved
| by Twitter and similar
| CalChris wrote:
| I have to be that guy for the family chat list as well. So I
| already have practice.
| climb_stealth wrote:
| I think the possibly big letdown at some point might be the
| non-intuitive or non-existing message backups. Getting started
| with and using Signal is great but the backup functionality
| stops me from recommending it to non-technical friends.
|
| Facebook messenger history is online and doesn't need to be
| thought about. I'm fearing there will be a fair bit of
| resentment once the non-technical Signal users change devices
| and realise that all their messaging history got lost in the
| process.
| throw14082020 wrote:
| What is happening here is interesting. Almost like facebook
| messenger has lost its network effects. Its so easy to install
| Signal and get setup, and there is a compelling reason to leave
| Facebook's ecosystem. I previously assumed the network effects
| were so strong no one could leave Facebook without being a
| hermit. It turns out people who actually want to contact me
| will actually bother to install Signal and join me.
| AlimJaffer wrote:
| I've managed to do the same as well - the pushback has been
| minimal at best. I'm more surprised at how many "X is on
| Signal!" messages I've received from completely non-technical
| friends.
| pjkundert wrote:
| Yup, my wife just move a large group of non-technicals from
| Facebook Messenger to Signal. No problems, thus far!
| dave_sid wrote:
| Band Mule has chat built in to it. As well as a calendar,
| scheduler, set list manager and audio player.
| patrickdavey wrote:
| I love signal, or at least the idea of it. I've been trying to
| get family onto it and away from WhatsApp for years, and we
| finally tried this week.
|
| Unfortunately, my messages to the family group are stuck spinning
| (24 hours now) and I'm not seeing any new messages in the group
| (and should be). Nightmare.
|
| If anyone knows a fix I'd love to hear it (have tried leaving the
| group and rejoining, restarting phone etc)
| pkulak wrote:
| > This is distinctly different than how iMessage and Telegram
| work because in both of those apps they store your private key.
|
| Does anyone have a moment to explain this one to me? Seems to me
| you'd of course have to store your own key on the device. And if
| Apple is storing it themselves... that's news to me and pretty
| concerning.
| rwcarlsen wrote:
| Here's an article that goes over some of the issues:
| https://www.tomshardware.com/news/imessage-weak-encryption-m...
| resonanttoe wrote:
| I think the author is over-simplifying here a deal.
|
| Page 99 here.
| https://manuals.info.apple.com/MANUALS/1000/MA1902/en_US/app...
|
| Which describes that the private keys are generated and held on
| device.
|
| Now I think this model *may change when you enable icloud
| messaging, in which case an encrypted messaging key may be
| stored in your icloud account. So you may opt to have apple
| store it, but in an encrypted manner that they can't undo. This
| part is a bit speculative on my part though, so grain of salt.
| JustinGarrison wrote:
| iMessage does store a secure key locally on your device which
| never leaves. The main difference with iMessage is Apple is
| able to add more signing keys to decrypt the data if they
| wanted. This is what happens when you add a new device.
|
| In a no-trust model once you sign in on a new device you
| wouldn't see all of your old messages. Because all of your old
| messages are decrypted and sent to the new device this is
| evidence that a new signing key was added to the communication
| chain.
|
| Apple could also do this to decrypt your messages to give to a
| government agency or for whatever purposes they want without
| notifying you.
|
| https://techcrunch.com/2014/02/27/apple-explains-exactly-how...
| 11thEarlOfMar wrote:
| After being in the business world for 30 years, one truism is
| that business relationships can only be sustained for the long
| term if the interests of the parties are aligned. All parties
| need to contribute and all parties need to benefit, and the
| contributions and benefits need to be commensurate all around.
|
| Social media and their users are struggling because their (our)
| interests have not been aligned all along. Initially, the
| services grew by providing great value. They developed equity
| through size and usage. Interests were not aligned for the long
| term because they lost money quarter after quarter. Then came the
| day they needed to convert the equity into revenue.
|
| At that point, the pendulum swung back the other way. The users
| had given up privacy and publicized their lives to the world and
| developed habitual (addictive?) use. The user experience
| deteriorated, '3rd parties' paid for access and insinuated their
| banners into our feeds. We've become invested in these platforms,
| in some cases literally by developing primary income from
| YouTube, Locals, OnlyFans, ...
|
| Clearly, we still don't have aligned business interests.
|
| How can 'Big Tech' and 5 billion Internet users align our
| interests for the long term?
| bdamm wrote:
| It seems clear that interests can be very aligned where users
| are paying for their product. It is only when services are
| "free" where alignment is an issue.
| crummy wrote:
| Free like Signal?
| hcurtiss wrote:
| That's a fair comment, but a non-profit that relies on
| donations (as opposed to selling services to somebody other
| than me) strikes me as very different than Facebook et al.
| krrrh wrote:
| It's a viable model though. WhatsApp had only ~50
| employees and already 500m users when it was purchased
| for ~$20B. They were already profitable on the $1/year
| after the first year subscription model.
|
| Signal is approaching similar metrics (except it's
| supported by a $50m endowment from Brian Acton instead of
| donations).
|
| It's easy to say that the mechanics of chat are pretty
| simple and a global chat service can be maintained by a
| roomful of engineers, but is the original algorithm-free,
| chronological Twitter that much more complex? It's hard
| to believe there aren't any other billionaires out there
| who would be willing to create an endowment securing the
| perpetual existence of a free social network.
|
| Charging $1 a year like WhatsApp used to wouldn't be such
| a bad idea once it got bootstrapped either, since it
| would make it much harder to run bot armies.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| No, _gratis_ like Facebook. Signal is a not-for-profit.
| dilippkumar wrote:
| > How can 'Big Tech' and 5 billion Internet users align our
| interests for the long term?
|
| This is a fascinating question, I want to see this discussed
| more. I'll throw some thoughts to get a conversation started:
|
| I would happily pay for big tech company services - if I'm
| worth $30 a month in advertising revenues, I'm willing to pay
| $30 to subscribe to the same services in exchange for privacy.
| I'm convinced that I'm not the only person who thinks like
| this. I am waiting for a product to come around and service
| this market.
|
| <Shut_up_and_take_my_money.jpeg>
| ip26 wrote:
| I suspect it's another micropayment problem. You're actually
| worth $0.05 in ad revenue (or something like that), but due
| to payment friction & billing fees you wind up paying monthly
| Spotify: $10 Facebook: $20 News x4 sources: $40 LinkedIn: $30
| HackerNews $5 Various Forums: $50 (etc)
|
| You get the idea- in the end you're paying incredible sums of
| money for a collection of services that just aren't worth all
| that much. A conclusion supported by the fact that your use
| of these services currently generates pennies a day in ad
| revenue.
|
| We can see this game at play today in news, where you could
| easily blow $50/mo subscribing to a small selection of decent
| papers. It's not a big deal if you only had one subscription,
| but few people read only one paper- or participate in only
| one social network.
|
| To make matters worse, as seen in the cable industry, paying
| subscribers by definition have money to spend. This means
| they are by definition the most valuable advertising targets,
| which makes the lure of advertising to your subscribers
| eventually impossible to resist...
| zamadatix wrote:
| While I think this market is definitely there I think the
| problem is it's the much smaller market so a company isn't
| going to make a competitive set of services and intentionally
| alienate the other e.g. 90% of users with it by doing pay
| only. On the flip side it's been shown that all but a very
| small fraction of that 10% will use the data sale funded
| version of these services it's all that's offered.
|
| So it ultimately comes down to "do we create an alternative
| funding model for that 1 percent of user space" which doesn't
| seem like much incentive vs trying to find ways to get more
| more out of the 99% of users.
|
| I think the only way this changes is if that userbase grows
| significantly, I don't think it's simply been an
| overlooked/forgotten internet business model.
| haram_masala wrote:
| Excellent comment. I'd say there are at least three possible
| answers to the question you pose at the end of it:
|
| 1. As another commenter replied, Big Tech will have to start
| charging market prices for their services.
|
| 2. Big Tech will be unable to charge for their services, and
| the business relationship between them and their users will
| collapse, taking Big Tech with it.
|
| 3. The relationship between Big Tech and its customers will
| change from a business relationship to something else, where
| the truism you stated will no longer applies.
|
| One might argue that (3) has already happened, and the
| "something else" is more like a manorial or totalitarian
| relationship, in which the interests of the users are
| irrelevant.
| dk2377 wrote:
| I give it a couple of weeks before screen shot of "violent"
| groups on Signal go viral, and the ban hammer will come unless
| they build a backdoor or remove the end-to-end encryption feature
| entirely.
| jkepler wrote:
| M'y guess is Moxie would shut the company down before
| introducing a backdoor.
|
| Also, if the gov tries to ban it, its just open-soirce
| software, right? Haven't courts (in the US at least) ruled that
| code is speech, and therefore protected from government
| restrictions by the 1st Amendment?
| dk2377 wrote:
| Yes but if there's political/public support, Big Tech will
| sure jump in and get rid of their potential competitor.
| grej wrote:
| Except I doubt that's how it will work. They just have to get
| Apple and Google to bow to the pressure again and remove it
| from the app store. Restricting the first amendment is a lot
| easier if you can effectively do it without actually doing it
| officially.
| Evidlo wrote:
| If you're referring to Facebook and Twitter banning Trump-
| related things, I think that was voluntary for them to avoid
| PR troubles.
| wsdrdsw wrote:
| I'm not sure I'm buying it but the fact that Telegram is not an
| american company is a big plus over Signal
| maciejw wrote:
| Some months ago Delta Chat [0] trended on HN. I think in a
| perfect world email based chat would solve a lot of the problems
| with current apps like Whatsapp or even Signal. But based on
| Gmail popularity I assume it would just mean that Google would
| get the data in most cases.
|
| [0] https://delta.chat
| exabrial wrote:
| One thing I wish signal had is key transparency. How come I can't
| see my own key hash and my contacts keys? I know they'r trying to
| keep it simple, but power users should be able to do this.
| codethief wrote:
| But you can? Open a conversation -> Menu -> Conversation
| settings -> View safety number.
|
| Note that the safety number is basically a combination of your
| and your contact's (DHKE-negotiated) keys and is thus going to
| be different for every conversation. The reason both keys are
| not shown separately is that it apparently confused users.
| wwright wrote:
| I think it's interesting that not many people here bring up
| Discord. It's by far the most challenging competitor for the
| average user, IMO. Full of features and very easy to use.
| moosebear847 wrote:
| Discord imo feels like 10 different spammy chat concert halls
| (rooms of 50+ people). Feature-wise though it has great group
| audio chat, and okay(a bit low-quality)-but-immediately-
| available video chat.
| Labo333 wrote:
| Discord is awesome but does not have support for end-to-end
| encryption AFAIK
| davb wrote:
| I'd probably switch to (and get friends to switch to) Signal if
| it supported Android Tablets and had a web app (like
| web.whatsapp.com). Those items might seem minor but having to
| always have my phone next to me, even when I'm browsing on my
| tablet, is inconvenient. Same goes for not being able to login
| easily to a semi-trusted device via the web (e.g. my work laptop
| - I don't want to install the desktop client, but I trust it
| enough to login to a web app, possibly in an incognito window).
| ggm wrote:
| It does work on tablets, but its a side load apk, and unlike
| laptop/desktop it cannot be used as an "adjunct" to your phone:
| it becomes an independent entity or takes over the entire
| state.
| sabellito wrote:
| Same here. The web client is extremely convenient.
| ArnoVW wrote:
| There's a desktop client that may be of use to you.
| jandrese wrote:
| The desktop client is sadly a bloated Electron app that has
| to be paired with your phone. Thankfully it's not
| completely hopeless as the pairing only has to happen once
| and it doesn't require your phone to be online all the time
| to work.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| Does Signal really not run on Android tablets? While you do
| need to receive an SMS to set up a Signal account, you can
| receive that SMS on any other device, even a dumbphone.
| sabellito wrote:
| I'd switch to signal over telegram if it had a web client :(
| kawfey wrote:
| I want to make my Signal (i.e. my personal cell phone number)
| public, but I don't want to put my cell phone number up to the
| internet to open up spam and MITM 2FA SMS attacks. What's the
| best way to do this?
|
| Burner SIM? Google Voice number? Landline service? Go find a
| payphone?
| thekyle wrote:
| Google Voice would probably be the best free option.
| codethief wrote:
| Or you wait till Signal works without phone numbers. See
| https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/kt91qk/signal_p...
| bilal4hmed wrote:
| The problem that Signal has to solve, transfer of new messages to
| a new phone. Right now the iOS transfer is a whole lot better
| than the manual android process ( ive heard the former is not
| fool proof )
|
| Being a house full of Pixel devices and sole IT person, I dont
| want to be responsible for lost messages when it comes time for a
| new phone.
|
| Also if your phone is lost or bricked ( either platform ) say
| goodbye to messages
|
| Moving from Android to iOS, bye messages.
|
| I can move my savvier friends and family over, but the rest will
| remain on whatsapp where "its easier" compromise works.
| FreakyT wrote:
| Exactly this. A lot of other messaging apps have this problem
| (read the App Store reviews of LINE for a sampler of people
| upset about it), and I find it baffling. Have these devs never
| lost a phone (or had one break unexpectedly?)
|
| It seems like it should be trivial to back up message history
| to the cloud.
| sliken wrote:
| Well trick is, once your phone is lost, will you remember a
| nice secure key?
|
| How do you protect from various evil entities from stealing
| your cloud backups?
| sliken wrote:
| I just migrated from a pixel 4xl -> 5 and back with signal.
|
| Nobody noticed, no warnings about encryption keys changing, no
| problems whatsoever. Took about 5 minutes each time (including
| googling of the directions).
|
| Just make a backup (with an encryption key), then do a restore
| (and enter said key). Not as convenient as if it was automatic,
| but it does seem like a pretty secure approach.
| bilal4hmed wrote:
| thats good to hear. Now I would like to see something on the
| desktop client
| sliken wrote:
| I had to relink my desktop client, but the history stayed.
| bilal4hmed wrote:
| on a new PC ?? the conversations came over ??
| sliken wrote:
| No. Had a desktop client linked to my phone. Migrated to
| a new phone, relinked the desktop client, and lost
| nothing.
| beagle3 wrote:
| You can't move WhatsApp message history between iOS and
| WhatsApp.
| bilal4hmed wrote:
| fair enough, still whatsapp android to android OR ios to ios
| is easier than Signal
| dilippkumar wrote:
| Comparing Signal features with Whatsapp I have two thoughts:
|
| 1. I noticed that Whatsapp allows me to add someone to a call
| (sort of like upgrading a phone call to a group call). I couldn't
| find a way to do that with Signal - although Signal supports
| group calls (that is, calling an entire group at once).
|
| It's a minor feature, but I discovered that I rely upon it quite
| often.
|
| 2. Last year, I attempted to switch from iOS to Android - and I
| discovered that there isn't a clean way to move my whatsapp
| messages over. On iOS, whatsapp creates a backup on iCloud, there
| isn't any way to recover that on Android.
|
| I aborted the attempt to switch to Android only because losing my
| whatsapp chat history was unacceptable.
|
| Signal currently seems to be just as bad. However, if signal can
| implement a reasonable way to create backups and recover them
| across devices and operating systems, it will seal the deal and
| convince me to permanently delete whatsapp from all my devices.
| bravura wrote:
| The "tied to your phone number" thing is weird for me, both
| Telegram and Signal.
|
| If you want to change your phone number, how do these platforms
| handle it? Do your contacts get updated or what? What happens to
| people with your old number?
|
| If your phone breaks, and you get a new one, how do they handle
| backups? (My iPhone's WhatsApp backups somehow disappeared when I
| got a droid.)
|
| These questions are particularly infuriating for digital nomads
| and people living abroad. I want an inexpensive cheap way to keep
| my US number I've had for 10 years. I've also heard horror
| stories that Google Voice (or Fi? Can't figure it out) will shut
| down your account if you live internationally.
| JustinGarrison wrote:
| I have a link in the post on how to use a twilio number instead
| of your real phone number. Signal PINS is the first step to
| making non-phone number identification work.
|
| https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007059792-Si...
| mynameisash wrote:
| I have no idea about phone number changes (I've had the same
| phone number for 20 years), but my phone broke not terribly
| long ago and I had to reinstall everything. As I recall, my
| Signal data came back just fine. Looks like you have to enable
| it[0], so I assume that's what I did.
|
| > The "tied to your phone number" thing is weird for me, both
| Telegram and Signal.
|
| Isn't this restriction also applicable to WhatsApp?
|
| [0] https://support.signal.org/hc/en-
| us/articles/360007059752-Ba...
| lasfallas wrote:
| I wish Signal had a setting for alternative media handling.
|
| Guessing that a lot of WhatsApp users like myself rely on the
| built in media backup to Google Drive. The automatically, well
| ordered media stored locally on the phone, with dates received in
| filenames, is great for people who like to have local media
| backups. WhatsApp image folder can also be added to services like
| the Google Pictures backup.
|
| All those missing features are Signal deal breakers for some
| people
| Evidlo wrote:
| So is everyone OK with this big migration to another centralized
| service that doesn't interoperate?
|
| Imagine if e-mail had been like this. You can't talk to your
| friends if they have a different provider, and you're not allowed
| to use your own client anymore.
| BoysenberryPi wrote:
| Can you not just place a regular call over wifi through Signal?
| It typically requires a phone number so I don't see why it
| wouldn't allow that.
| evilos wrote:
| Well signal does have the SMS fallback, it's just not secure.
| But neither is email.
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