Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications reddit / selfhosted ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-06 21:48 https://www.reuters.com/technology/cybersecurity/governments-spying- apple-google-users-through-push-notifications-us-senator-2023-12-06/ This pisses me off. Even our selfhosted apps mostly rely on centralised push notifications. If it's not Apple/Google, it's PWAs relying on centralised servers provided by the browser companies. Other protocols have their own push systems like email and XMPP, but for them to work reliably the phone can't put the app to sleep to save battery. Are there any reasonable alternatives? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Defiant-Ad-5513 · 2023-12-06 21:53 An idea would be to only send an id via the push notification and then make a request. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SLJ7 · 2023-12-06 22:30 There are already some apps that only push to the phone to tell a user there's something new. Then the app wakes up and checks what it is. Apps like Signal and WhatsApp *need* to work this way otherwise the security of e2e is completely undermined. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- AllTheModzAreCancer · 2023-12-06 22:59 You have no idea, and they do it more or less willingly. It's called "compulsory compliance". >"[GOOGLE is getting WH and State Dept. support & air cover. In reality, they are doing things the CIA cannot do.](https://web.archive .org/web/20130512233323/http://wikileaks.org/gifiles/docs/1121800_re- google-and-iran-internal-use-only-pls-do-not-forward-.html)" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- emprahsFury · 2023-12-06 23:07 Another sub, another post, another group of people proposing the same solution that doesn't even address the allegation. > have been asking Apple and Google for metadata related to push notifications to, for example, help tie anonymous users of messaging apps to specific Apple or Google accounts. Notifications are cryptographically signed from the dev account pushing it, with a recipient enmeshed in it. Encrypting the payload is not solving anything, because it's the cryptographic guarantee that the app & user are aware of each other that is important. It doesn't matter if WhatsApp is pushing the full message or Signal is pushing a "you have mail." Since this is self-hosted: Go to the Ntfy documentation and read about generating VAPID keys. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Mintfresh22 · 2023-12-06 23:14 Your tittle is stupid and misleading. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sintheticgaming · 2023-12-06 23:19 I mean are we surprised? They have spyware that they can install without any interaction from the user… Moral of the story governments spy they always have abs always will… want my honest opinion on alternatives to not be spied on? Ditch the smartphone or any “smart” device for that matter. Seriously there isn’t much you can do.. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- skyrunner15 · 2023-12-06 23:25 This might be the dumbest post I've seen in some time. If you use public cloud services, any and all material can be monitored or logged. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-06 23:37 It's the title of the news article I linked. 🤣 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- vijaykes · 2023-12-06 23:43 The article lists Metadata as the key thing. For example, correlating time of signal notifications with messages sent can be used to identify the owner of a certain channel, even if each 'push notification' is encrypted. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-06 23:43 Email, XMPP etc can all do this. That's how everything used to work, but it sucks battery to have all your apps constantly checking a server for updates. What we need is the ability to run our own push servers ... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-06 23:44 😢 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- AllTheModzAreCancer · 2023-12-06 23:48 [Oh, there are quite a few gems in wikileaks](https://web.archive.org/ web/20120331060130/https://wikileaks.org/gifiles/docs/1113282_re- analyst-tasking-client-question-israeli-strike-against.html). >"Thus even when it comes down to the unilateral strike, ***there will be*** ***some interest in implicating the U.S. in the conflict*** and getting it to come in and act. > >\[...\] > >In regards to an Israeli strike against Iran, we have written that the range and complexity of such an air campaign means that an air campaign carried out in coordination with the United States would likely be significantly more comprehensive and more effective - something Israel wants." ---------------------------------------------------------------------- DevelopedLogic · 2023-12-06 23:49 I connect any app that supports https://unifiedpush.org/ to a self hosted https://ntfy.sh instance for fully self hosted push notifications ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-06 23:55 > Encrypting the payload is not solving anything, because it's the cryptographic guarantee that the app & user are aware of each other that is important. It doesn't matter if WhatsApp is pushing the full message or Signal is pushing a "you have mail." Yes, it's a metadata leak. Though I'm curious about this line in another article: > In some cases, unencrypted content like the actual text displayed in the notification may be included too, Wyden adds. https://www.404media.co/us-government-warrant-monitoring-push- notifications-apple-google-yahoo/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-06 23:57 Just because you're right, doesn't mean I'm happy about it. :-P ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-06 23:58 The entire point of E2E is to make that not possible ... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-06 23:59 That doesn't solve the metadata leak though ... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 00:02 My understanding is that even with webpush all notifications still go through a centralised server. > Web Push (RFC8030) allows ntfy to receive push notifications, even when the ntfy web app (or even the browser, depending on the platform) is closed. When enabled, the user can enable background notifications for their topics in the wep app under Settings. Once enabled by the user, ntfy will forward published messages to the push endpoint (browser-provided, e.g. fcm.googleapis.com), which will then forward it to the browser. https://docs.ntfy.sh/config/?h=vapid#web-push ---------------------------------------------------------------------- DevelopedLogic · 2023-12-07 00:06 https://docs.ntfy.sh/faq/#is-firebase-used ---------------------------------------------------------------------- skyrunner15 · 2023-12-07 00:11 Who has the keys? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ithilelda · 2023-12-07 00:11 that's web push for browsers... he's talking about unified push, which is sent through the ntfy app using either polling or websocket without going through any google service. The downside is thatot you need to have the ntfy app running in the background. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ericesev · 2023-12-07 00:11 >What we need is the ability to run our own push servers ... Will that help though? Maybe I'm missing the context, but it sounds like the concern is that a government could tell if someone was running Signal/WhatsApp. If we each ran our own servers wouldn't the same thing be possible by asking our ISP for metadata? \- Signal/WhatsApp pushing a notification to our own servers still identifies us as users as our ISP can reveal the data. \- Signal/WhatApp running their own notification service still identifies us as users for the same reason. \- Connecting to a VPN service also won't help as timing analysis from the ISP or VPN server metadata will have the same issue. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- trararawe · 2023-12-07 00:26 I bet there aren't many apps that support that though ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 00:29 The point of E2E encryption is that only the user has the keys. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 00:30 ah, thanks! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 00:39 > Signal/WhatsApp pushing a notification to our own servers still identifies us as users as our ISP can reveal the same metadata. I was thinking more for selfhosted applications. If I run a Matrix server and can register it with a selfhosted push server, and configure the OS to use my own push server ... then there is no longer a central place to subpoena ... But yes, it's always going to be possible for law enforcement to get some metadata. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- TechyRyan33 · 2023-12-07 00:40 Wish we could change apps to use selfhosted notification servers like Ntfy. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- fellipec · 2023-12-07 00:56 And other day a guy was mad at me because I said espionage exists and the USA gov infiltrate tech companies... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Mintfresh22 · 2023-12-07 01:11 That isn't what the article says at all. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sintheticgaming · 2023-12-07 01:15 I mean I agree I’m not happy about it either haha ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 01:34 I don't know what you're trying to say. It's literally the title of the article in the first link of my post. "Governments spying on Apple, Google users through push notifications" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 01:34 Yeah, me too! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- terAREya · 2023-12-07 01:39 >https://www.reuters.com/technology/cybersecurity/governments-spying- apple-google-users-through-push-notifications-us-senator-2023-12-06/ So you're saying signal, whatsapp, telegram, etc have been a big lie about end to end encryption where even the provider cannot see the data? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- terAREya · 2023-12-07 01:45 I wonder, are officials infiltrating groups on telegram and sending push messages to users they want to unveil? For example they @ message someone they want more information on a bunch of times and note the specific time stamps and then subpoena push notification records and match real person to their anonymous telegram handle? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Bagelsarenakeddonuts · 2023-12-07 01:56 Whatsapp e2e has been hilariously riddled with holes. Sure the message is encrypted… but the sender Id, the receiver id, and all possible related data is passed straight to facebook. Along with timestamps, context etc. etc. its straight in their TOS. Why i ditched it and went to Signal. Whatsapp e2e is kinda like super ultra secretly adding a poster to a public bulletin board… ---------------------------------------------------------------------- nemec · 2023-12-07 01:57 The government has always been able to get metadata about messages for E2EE content. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- nemec · 2023-12-07 01:58 Why would they need to do that when they could simply subpoena the company for user data related to the user they'd be sending a push to. The government would already have their username/userid. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 02:12 Yes. But skyrunner15 was saying that they can get 'any and all material' which isn't true with E2E. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- nemec · 2023-12-07 02:19 They're talking about push notification metadata, not encrypted messages. You misinterpreted them. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- terAREya · 2023-12-07 02:29 They cant correlate user data from telegram for example to a gmail account. With push data from both they can correlate all your accounts. ​ Or am I missing something? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- terAREya · 2023-12-07 02:30 The comment I replied to is saying Signal is also "monitored and logged". So I still have the same question, was end to end encryption a lie? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- nemec · 2023-12-07 02:33 If you used the same phone number for both they certainly can. But anyway, I said the government doesn't need to *force* a push notification to users because if that feature is turned on, they can just subpoena the existing information from any time telegram has sent you push notifications in the past. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- rokejulianlockhart · 2023-12-07 02:50 Can't Ntfy be self hosted? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- terAREya · 2023-12-07 02:53 Totally true. I guess my point was more: 1. join a "t3rror telegram group" 2. see user called 876365474\_hacker45 saying terrible things 3. use push data to find gmail, appleID, etc Without being in the group and seeing that they NEED this guys info why they wouldnt have a need to subpoena any data right? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ForeverAProletariat · 2023-12-07 03:12 meh, all giant tech companies are controlled by the feds. it's basically what Americans think China is like. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- RydRychards · 2023-12-07 03:30 Is pushing the content of the message still default in signal? I never got why it was the default and people called me crazy for thinking it could be used to spy on the content. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- tribak · 2023-12-07 03:40 oh no! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- unengaged_crayon · 2023-12-07 03:52 yes, because this is not something that is known? > seriously there isn’t much you can do.. you are on r/selfhosted. you know exactly what you can do. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 03:52 Yes, but it still relies on centralised push servers to deliver notifications. Unless you are using instant delivery which is only supported on Android. https://docs.ntfy.sh/faq/#what-is-instant-delivery ---------------------------------------------------------------------- f3xjc · 2023-12-07 04:58 What if you had like 100 different channel and each of them send push notifications. And you kind don't know which push is for which channel. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ExcessiveEscargot · 2023-12-07 05:01 Security through obscurity. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- f3xjc · 2023-12-07 05:04 If all you have is metadata correlation then yes injecting noise is pretty much the only counter measure. That or abandon the channel that is somewhat observable. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- thecomputerguy7 · 2023-12-07 05:15 Dumb question but with the concern over metadata leaks, why not have the notification server spam “you have a notification” messages, and encode a secret, similar to a TOTP. Maybe a TOTP like stream of numbers encoded in the subject, but not rendered by the server/client interfaces. Your average user would never know, and theoretically every message would be roughly the same size. Notification + 6-8 character string created by a shared secret between client and server. If the message doesn’t match the shared secret, then it can be discarded. If it does, it must be a legitimate message, and should actually be parsed by the application and presented to the user as a visible “you’ve got mail” pop up. Sure, you could intercept the notification, decrypt it somehow, and try to reverse engineer the token, but you’d have no real way of figuring out the actual legitimate codes. You could take over a client or server running the software, but at that point, you’ve already gotten the actual content. Chat logs, files, etc. you don’t need the notifications. Constant messages would hose the ability to match the metadata stream with a target, as there can be one every X/random seconds. You’d have no (reliable) way of linking someone based on those “you’ve got mail” notifications as you don’t know if they are genuine or not unless you’ve broken the shared secret. If you can break the shared secret, then notification metadata is the least the user needs to worry about. Now, I absolutely have no clue how push notifications work, and if this is even a feasible option but it’s just an idea that popped in my head. I’d imagine this would absolutely hammer battery life, and would only be usable in a very rare and specific circumstances, assuming it would even be technically possible at all. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- vikarti_anatra · 2023-12-07 05:17 UnifiedPush? Which itself could work via Google or ntfy (including with you own server) or some other things - [https://unifiedpush.org/users/distribu tors/](https://unifiedpush.org/users/distributors/) , yes ntfy means active foreground notification and you need to disable all kinds of power optimizations but it could be made work. Matrix protocol specifically allows this use case. Some Matrix clients allow configurable push distributor. Some Mastodon clients also allow this - [https://unifiedpush.org/users /apps/](https://unifiedpush.org/users/apps/) ​ Another possible alternative: Russian RuStore tries to make it's own push solution (including all background optimizations). VK/MailRu group have money and developers to make it actually working. If you threat model doesn't consider *Russian* goverment as threat (either because you like them or think they can't do anything to you because of your jurisdiction) - you could have interesting option by using apps which use RuStore's push notifications. yes, RuStore do accept English-language apps, even monetization is supported) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 05:33 I don't see any technical reason why you couldn't do that, but I imagine that one the scale of WhatsApp/iMessage that would be pretty insanely expensive? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 05:41 Unified Push has got a bit more tracting since the last time I looked, very cool! Just wish there was a way to get iOS to play ball ... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- FierceDeity_ · 2023-12-07 05:58 > and you need to disable all kinds of power optimizations but it could be made work. I mean, google's own push notifier is technically a foreground app, you just don't get to know about it. If you disable that one, now you have more battery for a new one in the foreground. I mean, that's the whole point anyway, trade many foreground applications checking for messages with a single one that polls a server instead ---------------------------------------------------------------------- FierceDeity_ · 2023-12-07 05:59 Maybe the alternative app store functionality that is coming (hopefully not only in the EU) gives us something ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Disastrous_Elk_6375 · 2023-12-07 06:11 No, e2e still works. What this is is a metadata leak. You can't see what they are talking but you can see that they are talking. And, in some cases who talks with who. The problem is that a lot of people either don't understand or they downplay the amount of information that can be gathered from metadata. You can build an enormous amount of intelligence from graph knowledge about someone, from metadata alone. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- RedditSlayer2020 · 2023-12-07 06:20 Correction: ... any and all material WILL and IS monitored by 3rd parties. USER data and especially meta data is profitable. I agree with your statement, so many naive , ignorant and even totally uneducated people... Most are so deeply brainwashed and lulled into the illusion of privacy and security by corporations and government its heartbreaking. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- RedditSlayer2020 · 2023-12-07 06:23 Yes of course but people believe in their hallucinations and fantasies because they are comforting nice and soothing. Reality is harsh cruel and simply not pleasant people love to be manipulated and lied to and will fiercely defend those doing it because their whole world view would be shattered. The ego can't handle it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- blackstar2043 · 2023-12-07 06:35 For those who may be interested, there is a Signal fork that uses UnifiedPush with NTFY, but it requires extra software to operate: https://github.com/mollyim/mollyim-android-unifiedpush https://github.com/mollyim/mollysocket ---------------------------------------------------------------------- NewspaperEcstatic884 · 2023-12-07 07:05 "If you do not care for Firebase, I suggest you install the F-Droid version of the app and self-host your own ntfy server." You are in the selfhosted chanel, so ... :-P ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SteelDingus · 2023-12-07 07:06 Don't allow push notifications. Problem solved. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- collimarco · 2023-12-07 07:30 Web Push Notifications \[are encrypted end-to- end\](https://pushpad.xyz/blog/web-push-notifications-and-privacy), so probably they are only talking about "native app" notifications. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 07:31 🤞🏻 🤞🏻 🤞🏻 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 07:32 I think, but am not sure, that Apple/Google push notifications are encrypted as well? But mostly the article is about metadata leaks, which is still a problem with webpush. :-( ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 07:33 I'd be interested to hear from someone that knows more than me. I suspect you have to disable notifications on the server rather than the device? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SteelDingus · 2023-12-07 07:37 > I'd be interested to hear from someone that knows more than me. This is not an accurate description of me, sorry. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 07:58 haha! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- qfla · 2023-12-07 09:10 Or they get mad stating that 'i have nothing to hide sso it does not concern me' Its about basic right to privacy ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ph33rlus · 2023-12-07 09:39 How does Home assistant push notifications work? I’ve had them trigger when I’m not home and I didn’t sign up to the Cloud aspect of it? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-07 09:41 No idea sorry! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- evilgold · 2023-12-07 11:25 The talk of battery drain for apps that don't use google's system are highly exaggerated. I use GrapheneOS with google services isolated to only the work profile so i can easily turn it on and off as needed and none of my communication apps use Google's services. They don't consume a substantial amount more of battery by running that way. If you're rom/phone allows it you might consider just giving it a try without google services installed, or if you for sure need them you can still restrict it to just a single user profile that isn't your main one. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- binwiederhier · 2023-12-07 12:29 If you're talking about iOS, then centralized server does not see the notification though. See https://blog.ntfy.sh/2023/12/06/138-lines- of-code/#ios-app ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dopeytree · 2023-12-07 12:45 Suppose its the quotient to tracking dialled phone numbers ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Mintfresh22 · 2023-12-07 13:18 Did you try reading the article? You should do that sometime, you wouldn't sound so dumb in your off topic post. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- flattop100 · 2023-12-07 13:22 I have 3 or 4 apps set to silent (Android). I still get notifications from those apps, they're just not showing up. makes me wonder if we can truly disable notifications? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- frankmcc · 2023-12-07 13:28 Why does everyone seem surprised when they see something like this? The government has never been and never will be your friend. They are a necessary evil that exists only because most of us don't want anarchy. Never Trust, Always Verify. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Slackbeing · 2023-12-07 13:39 Obfuscation isn't security through obscurity: it's obfuscation. That's how much of TOR works, or even [SSH](https://undeadly.org/cgi?action=article;sid=20230829051257) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SavageIndustries · 2023-12-07 14:25 I mean, if you're really worried about shit like this - then switch to a dumb phone. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sadicarnot · 2023-12-07 14:59 This is not news, when Snowden released the information about the Prism program they stopped collecting everything and just started collecting the metadata. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- natermer · 2023-12-07 15:07 This sort of thing is used to "justify" more intrusive surveillance. There is a sort of "guilt through association" practiced by these intelligence agencies. Say they are monitoring traffic for particular "people of interest" in China because they are monitoring for corporate espionage involving defense agencies. And Chinese National "person of interest" 'X' is communicating a lot with American Contractor 'Y'. They can track that through push notifications. They don't care what exactly is being said, but are more interested in the fact that communication is happening in the first place. This then allows them to "justify" to their secret "courts" that they are allowed to place'Y' under more severe surveillance. However 'Y' is a friend of a friend. For whatever reason Y communicates with his friend 'Z' and 'Z' communicates with you. They can tell that you are communicating. That is the important part. They don't care what you said. Well that then "justifies" putting Z and you under much more severe surveillance. So they can do more targeted attacks like getting access to your emails or having your wireless telephone company to activate monitoring features on your phone's radio firmware. etc etc. So in this case generating noise isn't going to help you. In fact it will increase their "justification" for monitoring because it looks like you are taking active measures to avoid them. What is more this is all can be retroactive. Since they can potentially store this data for years. Which means that if person "Y" shows up on their radar then they can go back in time to see who they have communicated with and so on and so forth. This sort of thing is why people hate the Patriot Act. It legalizes this sort of guilt through association monitoring. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ExcessiveEscargot · 2023-12-07 15:12 Sorry, I missed where I claimed obfuscation is security through obscurity? It's the other way around; security through obscurity relies on the protection of obfuscation rather than the security of the algorithms or mechanisms themselves. Your examples are pretty poor too: the "chaos" of TOR can be tracked and traced if enough information can be obtained from the entry/exit node(s) so you rely on them being secure, they're pretty well-known vulnerabilities. CSI units literally undo shredding with a combination of manual work and technology - it's not just in the movies. I have no idea about SSH but my point (I guess I'm making one now, I didn't in my original comment) isn't that obfuscation can't add a later of security to a system but rather that in and of itself it's not generally that secure. By all means, throw as many steps and obstacles for intruders to have to wade through - just don't expect a single layer to provide ultimate protection. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- natermer · 2023-12-07 15:12 > If we each ran our own servers wouldn't the same thing be possible by asking our ISP for metadata? It is much harder, much more expensive. And they need to actually write letters and so on and so forth. With Google it is much easier. They pay Google billions of dollars for private government-only datacenters and Google will just funnel all the requested data for everybody into those DCs as part of the deal. This relates to a dirty secret about cloud providers... Big cloud providers like Google, AWS, Microsoft Azure, etc.. They would very likely be money losers if it wasn't for the massive government contracts. This means the conflict of interest involved are massive. It would be very easy for a angry Senator on a intelligence committee to "punish" these corporations for not playing ball. Even small changes to languages in spending authorizations can cost these companies hundreds of millions of dollars long term. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- default_user_acct · 2023-12-07 15:13 Signal has a setting for this, I've been using it for a while. Sounds like they just need to make it the default. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- hackermarks · 2023-12-07 15:26 I know atleast iPhone devices allows code execution within the app on notification delivery. They also support hidden notifications, which is not interacting as a usual notification. It’s also possible to have offline from-app notifications. This way someone could make a hidden notification with encrypted data, to send to the device, then app can open and decrypt to then show the actual notification. I do believe it’s already introduced in some apps, however we need this to be the common practice. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Slackbeing · 2023-12-07 15:33 > Sorry, but I never claimed obfuscation is security through obscurity? >>> And you kind don't know which push is for which channel. >> Security through obscurity. But besides that: > security through obscurity relies on the protection of obfuscation rather than the security of the algorithms or mechanisms themselves. Lol, no. Security through obscurity relies on something that not being known to the attacker. e.g. you move your open telnet port to 42069. If the obfuscation is known to the attacker there's nothing "security through obscurity" about it, it just makes it harder for the attacker to, well, perform whatever attack. And like any security measure, it becomes increasingly weak the more resourceful and dedicated the attacker is. > CSI units literally undo shredding with a combination of manual work and technology - it's not just in the movies. And lockpickers open locks, it's not just in the movies. Has nothing to do with STO. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- f3xjc · 2023-12-07 15:38 But here we are talking about the situation where SomeMessageApp ,for example, sends the push notification "*knock knock* check your mail". They will know that person X and person Z both talked to the SomeMessageApp infrastructure. But so have done millions of others. Now if they have warrant to force SomeMessageApp to reveal the missing metadata that's another story. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- programmrz · 2023-12-07 15:42 I think iMessage does exactly this ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ericesev · 2023-12-07 15:45 >It is much harder, much more expensive. And they need to actually write letters and so on and so forth. I may not be completely following this. 702 still requires approval from the court for each request. What's the difference if the individual request goes to Apple/Google vs AT&T/Verizon/T-Mobile/etc? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Bladeslap · 2023-12-07 16:40 I do like the irony that before I could read the article I had to choose whether or not to allow cookies for the website to track my activity! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- vijaykes · 2023-12-07 18:23 Agree with @ExcessiveEscargot. When we say something is "secure", we mean that everything about security mechanism (except key) is known to the attacker and still it is "hard" to crack. This hardness can be quantified: for example, you can say that my mechanism is as hard to crack as factorizing a 1000 digit number. In your example, as you pointed out, the cracking task is as easy as going over 64000 something port numbers. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- thuhstog · 2023-12-07 19:06 why are they only mentioning apple and google? isn't microsoft right up there with office365 ? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- natermer · 2023-12-07 19:55 For 'somemessageapp' to work to connect to people together the service needs to know the origin of the message and then the destination. The sender and the receiver. Even if the actual message is pure 'P2P' your stuff will still rely on a central service to find the other user(s). Also it is going to know the date/time the message was sent, when it was received and path the data was sent. Beyond that for push notifications to work your phone needs to be subscribed and listening for the notification. So they are going to know when you have your phone on and when you don't. So if a particular crime was committed and they think it is related to you they will know when your phone is connected to the service. They will also be able to tie that into other 'metadata' and know if your phone was in a particular service area and was turned off/data was disabled or if you were outside of a service area. "millions" are not a particular big number for the amount of resources they have dedicated to this sort of thing. It still wouldn't be hard for them to find out if you were in communication for a foreign entity and stuff like that. This is the sort of data they use to acquire authorization for more direct approaches. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- natermer · 2023-12-07 20:05 The data collection is done regardless of court orders. That is done constantly and for as many people/services they can. They will have that stuff sitting in their servers by default. The "court order" is only required to actually query the databases for specific people. And, likely, that is only if they care about actually using the data in a case. Collecting logs of IPs and trying to trace protocols based on packet inspect is a lot more expensive and less practical. They will do it, of course. But it isn't going to be nearly as wide-spread as just saving the data for a central service. It would be something a bit more targeted. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- aeroverra · 2023-12-07 20:32 Everyone asking "why is everyone surprised?". I know the answer to this one. We are called crazy on a regular basis by average people who don't care so much that sometimes we like to believe it's not as simple as we know it is. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- thecomputerguy7 · 2023-12-07 20:36 Absolutely. Probably technically possible but absolutely not practical for anybody who can’t self host it. I’d imagine the sheer amount of traffic alone would be insane if it was on the scale of iMessage or something ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear-Virus-6050 · 2023-12-07 20:39 Anyone who tried to tell the Signal or Privacy Guides moderators this was EXACTLY how they likely got Tucker Carlsons Signal messages got banned instantly and shouted down as conspiracy theorists. Funny how things pan out huh? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Infinite__Okra · 2023-12-07 21:17 It’s good that they have nothing to hide because at this point just about nothing is hidden. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SLJ7 · 2023-12-07 21:35 That's not what I'm talking about. A push notification—from what I understand—can actually wake up an app and tell it to check for something. This is how a lot of modern apps already work. The app doesn't have to stay running, it just needs to run some kind of process to decrypt the notification. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- droans · 2023-12-07 21:44 Sorry - are you saying you think the CIA is going to kill a sitting Senator? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- droans · 2023-12-07 21:50 Yeah. You could use public key signing and the message and metadata would be "unreadable", but it's really not. Google and Apple would need to know which app is sending it to prevent a third party from spamming phones with ad notifications. They also would know what server it came from already. And, of course, they know who it is getting delivered to. There's no solution that would fix this while leaving middlemen involved. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- AllTheModzAreCancer · 2023-12-07 23:15 Don't try to put that on me. I'm not saying anything. I just pasted part of a leaked email from Stratfor (one of the leading geopolitical intelligence firms in the country). If you think that you're understanding of how the world works is greater than theirs then take it up with them. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- benjiro3000 · 2023-12-07 23:28 > Will that help though? Makes you more of a suspect... Recently there was a case in France, where they argued that because a person was trying to avoid "normal" communication, that person had something to hide. The fact that this person was just more security focused, made his a actual target. You must do something illegal, if your trying to run privacy focused hardware and software. Guilty by default, and you need to prove your innocent with ... give access to all your data to see if your really just privacy focused or doing illegal stuff. Its like using encryption, what they are trying to ban in so many countries or have backdoors because using encryption means you have something to hide! What is next, curtains on your house? What are you hiding, are so some kind of pedo doing bad things to kids!??? And i am using the pedo argument because geez, is that used a LOT in context of privacy invading proposals. Reality is, by acting like the herd, your actually more safer from a privacy point of view, then actually trying to "hide". ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-08 01:28 But if you're relying on centralised push notifications, how does that solve the metadata leak problem? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-08 01:32 Probably because Apple & Google control all the mobile devices? If you're using M365 you've already given MS all your data. :-) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- thuhstog · 2023-12-08 05:05 I'd have thought it was more about the servers owners giving metadata, on what they have pushed to devices, rather than governments collecting it from devices? Did I read it wrong ? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-08 05:09 You are totally right, this is a metadata leak. I was just ... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SLJ7 · 2023-12-08 07:22 It doesn't, I'm only pointing out that actual content isn't included no matter what. It's still a huge privacy concern and I'm not sure what would actually solve it without compromise on the user side. Part of the reason centralized push is so desirable is because the phone only needs to connect to one place. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand · 2023-12-08 08:13 👍🏻 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2023-12-10 16:51 [removed] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Fearless_Gap_9878 · 2023-12-11 10:58 Done. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dianefoxingtongirl · 2023-12-13 09:49 I'm really confused, can I ask a question? Does this mean they can see the actual *text content*? Or just the Metadata? And what does the Metadata entail? Just the username and time the message was sent but not the contents? I want to be sure since I'm nervous about this ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dianefoxingtongirl · 2023-12-13 09:50 I'm really confused, can I ask a question? Does this mean they can see the actual *text content*? Or just the Metadata? And what does the Metadata entail? Just the username and time the message was sent but not the contents? In some of my apps I have a setting that notifications don't show the text content or even the username, just shows the number of missed messages. Will that protect me from this issue? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dianefoxingtongirl · 2023-12-13 09:51 I'm really confused, can I ask a question? Does this mean they can see the actual *text content*? Or just the Metadata? And what does the Metadata entail? Just the username and time the message was sent but not the contents? In some of my apps I have a setting that notifications don't show the text content or even the username, just shows the number of missed messages. Will that protect me from this issue? If it's in PMs on a fediverse site with e2e encryption they can't see it right? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SLJ7 · 2023-12-13 10:00 For apps with e2e the push data definitely doesn't include the message content. For apps which implement this well, it doesn't include the sender either. Changing preview settings doesn't change what is sent to the push servers in most cases, since often that's just a quick notification telling the app to wake up and check for something new. However, this depends very much on the app in question. In the case of apps like Signal and fediverse apps which also have some level of privacy, I am not sure what the metadata could tell the government about you. That's something you might want to ask in a separate r/privacy thread. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- dianefoxingtongirl · 2023-12-13 15:09 If it doesn't include the content how does it show the content in the notification? Am I correct in understanding that with E2EE it's just gonna send "hey, there was a message" over the servers, but not the decrypted form and only the encrypted form, and the phone is the one decrypting the content, and shows it **locally?** That's how it allows for showing the content in the notification? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SLJ7 · 2023-12-13 18:58 I'm not sure whether it even sends the content or whether it just tells the app to wake up a small part of itself and refresh the data. But if it did send the content, it would certainly be encrypted and unreadable by anyone who isn't you. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- f1ve_f00t_freek · 2023-12-27 09:11 SIGNAL has a NAME ONLY option for push messages, its what i use, so all they see is NEW MESSAGE FROM 'X' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SLJ7 · 2023-12-27 09:33 I do that in iOS settings so when my phone is unlocked the full message is shown, but when it's locked it only shows the name. It’s a bit less secure but I'm not in the habit of giving random people access to my phone, so I'm not worried. I don't think your method adds any security advantages other than that. Signal is still locally decrypting the message whether it's showing previews or not; that's a cornerstone of e2e apps.