1/ In defense of #Signal. Yes, I'm a guy that just posted a roundup of distributed/mesh messengers https://changelog.complete.org/archives/10205-roundup-of-secure-messengers-with-off-the-grid-capabilities-distributed-mesh-messengers of which #Signal was obviously not part. I am really excited about the potential of those.
But to the general public, I still recommend Signal. Here's why.
2/ #Signal brings #encryption and #privacy to meet people where they're at, not the other way around. People don't have to choose a server, it can automatically recognize contacts that use Signal, it has emojis, attachments, secure voice and video calling, and they all just work (Musk aside). It feels, and is, a polished, modern experience with the bells and whistles they are used to.
3/ I am a huge fan of #Matrix/#Element and even run my own instance. It has huge promise. But it is Not. There. Yet. Some reasons:
#Synapse, the only currently viable Matrix server, is not ready. My Matrix instance hosts ONE person, me. Synapse uses many GB of RAM and 10+GB of disk space, with little tuning for either. It's caused OOMs more than once. And this is AFTER extensive tuning. It cannot be hosted on a Raspberry Pi or even one of the cheaper VPSs.
4/ Choosing a #Matrix instance. Well you could just tell a person to use matrix.org. But then it spent a good portion of last year unable to federate with other popular nodes due to Synapse limitations. Or you could pick a random node, but will it be up when someone needs to say "my car broke down?" Some are run from a dorm computer, some by a team in a datacenter, some by one person with EC2, and you can't really know. Will it be stable and long-lived? Hard to say.
5/ Voice and video calling is not there yet. Matrix has two incompatible video calling methods (Jitsi and built-in), neither work consistently well, both are hard to manage, and both have NAT challenges.
6/ #Matrix is so hard to set up on a server that there is matrix-docker-ansible-deploy https://matrix.org/docs/projects/other/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy/ . This makes it much better but it is STILL terribly hard to deploy, and very simple things like "how do I delete a user" or "let me shrink down this 30GB database" are barely there yet, if at all.
7/ Encryption is not mandatory in #Matrix. E2EE has been getting DRAMATICALLY better in the last few releases, but it is still optional, especially for what people would call "group chats" (rooms). Signal is ALWAYS encrypted. Always. (Unless, I guess, you set it as your SMS provider on Android). You've got to take the responsibility off the user to verify encryption status and make it the one and only way to use the ecosystem.
8/ Again, I LOVE #Matrix. I use it every day to interact with Matrix, IRC, Slack, and Discord channels. It has a TON of promise. But would I count on it to carry a "my car's broken down and I'm stranded" message? No.
9/ What about some of the other options out there? #Briar is fantastic and its offline options are novel and promising. But in common usage, it can't deliver a message unless both devices are online simultaneously, and doesn't run on iOS (though both are being worked on). It also can't send photos or do voice or video calling.
10/ Some of those same limitations apply to most of the alternatives also. Either that, or they are encryption-optional, or terribly hard to set up and use. Just today, I boosted a post about #Status, which shows a ton of promise also. But it's got no voice or video calling capabilities. How about #Scuttlebutt? Fantastic protocol, extremely difficult onboarding (lengthy process, error-prone finding a sub, multi-GB initial download, etc)
11/ So #Signal gives people: dead-simple setup, store-and-forward delivery, encrypted everything, encrypted voice/video calls, ability to send photos/video encrypted. If you are going to tell someone "it's so EASY to get your texts away from Facebook and AT&T", THIS IS THE THING you've got to point them to. It may not be in 2 years, but for now, it is. Do not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. It advances the status quo without harming usability, which nothing else does yet.
12/ I am aware of all of the very legitimate criticisms of #Signal. They are real and they are why I am excited that there are so many alternatives with promise, some of which I use actively. Let us technical people use, debug, contribute, and evangelize the alternatives.
And while we're doing that, tell Grandma to contact us on Signal.
/END
@jgoerzen great exposition, most comprehensive address to my objections. still: i don't want to give my phone number to people i don't trust (that is moxie and openwhisper and all who can grab it from the discovery process, like the police, the state, fascists, etc). i don't want them to have my kid's phone number either, nor my friends and comrades. 1/
@zeh
It may be worth reiterating at this point that although Signal uses your phone number as a user identifier, I'm not actually sure of they store it or just a hash of it, and they definitely don't transmit otjer numbers from your contacts for discovery:
https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007061452-Does-Signal-send-my-number-to-my-contacts-
They also announced they're trying to move away from using phone numbers at all (the recent intoduction of PINs is in preparation of that) -- but it may take some time
@jgoerzen
@Mr_Teatime @jgoerzen @zeh #OWS keeps a copy of your phone number on record for account recovery purposes. Of course, this also opens you up to various attacks and compromises.
Hm... yeah, makes sense. Would it be possible to do those things without storing the user ID?
@Mr_Teatime @zeh @jgoerzen It occurs to me that they could theoretically store a hash, and then ask for the ph# again at acct recovery time, then compare the hashes. But I don't give OWS the benefit of the doubt considering how they push users into Google Playstore & claim it's safer than the APK download which they hide. It's hard to trust OWS anytime trust is needed.
As far as I can tell, they are pretty good at minimizing the amount of stored data, including profile, contact data, metadata etc:
https://signal.org/bigbrother/
As far as i can tell, they don't have more than the phone number (hashed or not, not sure, haven't found the info yet)
Also, the code is open source, so it is testable whether it does what OWS says it does -- no need to speculate.
@Mr_Teatime @resist1984 @jgoerzen oh, look at that. not only is #signal hostile to federation and freedom, centralized and closed source (no new code published for a year), they also gone full cryptoscam now. who could have possibly imagined something like this.
Cryptoscam? Which news did I miss again? Do you have a link or something?
Also, they do have a reson for not federating -- I think there are more important counterarguments, but it's a valid one: Federating means the server will be operated by loads of different people, some of whom might not know what they're doing or be malevolent, and regular users can't (and shouldn't have to) make sure that their own and their contacts' providers do everything right.
@resist1984
oh wow... thanks for the hint!
I think I agree with Schneier on all points: Signal is currently (still ... so far) the best messenger "for the masses", and attaching a cryptocurrency to it is dangerous and smelly. Very smelly.
And it does reduce my esteem for Moxie Marlinspike, who has in the past walked away from large piles of money in favour of the common good.
Wonder if the recent success went to his head.
@Mr_Teatime @zeh @jgoerzen I've always considered #Signal trash (see https://github.com/privacytoolsIO/privacytools.io/issues/779). For #Schneier to endorse it for "grandma" neglects the fact that Signal is exclusive. It completely disservices grandmas who just want to reach everyone. Signal excludes those without mobile phones & those unwilling to share their number with OWS, which makes grandma exclusive.
@resist1984
»Without mobile phones«
So ... that grandma in your example has a PC/laptop but no smartphone, or has a smartphone but is unwilling to tell others her phone number?
I'd say there's a few orders of magnitude fewer people who fall into that category than the people who have nothing but a smartphone and don't know how to use it for anything but facebook and whatsapp.
*both* groups are important but for the second one, Signal is the best thing out there.
@Mr_Teatime @jgoerzen @zeh grandma may have 50+ people in the family. Do all 50+ family members have a both a mobile phone & the willingness to share their number with OWS? Both of my grandmas would be excluding me if they were to use Signal.
@resist1984
Your grandma has funny priorities.
My grandma never had anything but a landline telephone.
My father progressed 2y ago from being able to play solitaire on an old Windows XP laptop to being able to watch youtube videos on an old Windows7 laptop, still has no e-mail, and his dumbphone mostly stays in the drawer.
He's not excluding anyone, he just finds that stuff annoying to deal with. You wanna call him, you use the landline. Same number as the last 41 years.
@jgoerzen @zeh
@Mr_Teatime @zeh @jgoerzen it would be bizarre priorities for a grandma /not/ to be inclusive. What grandma is going to not talk to a family member for not having a mobile phone? Of course grandma wants to talk to everyone, whether they have a mobile phone or not-- a requirement that #Signal can't meet. Wire can. Wire is inclusive, so it makes more sense for a family to use.
@jgoerzen @zeh @Mr_Teatime If Wire were to sell out to GAFAM and start requiring a mobile phone like Signal does, I'm sure Jami will have sufficiently improved by then.
@Mr_Teatime @zeh @jgoerzen The only thing unusual about my grandma is she uses linux. Which is not to say she's technologically advanced, but she never used Windows or Mac, so she never had the disadvantage of developing bad habits & proprietary knowledge in the days before linux became user friendly.
@jgoerzen @zeh @Mr_Teatime regarding your grandma never having anything but a landline telephone-- that excludes her from using Signal. Wire would work with just a landphone, dial-up access, and an old desktop, if necessary.
@resist1984
...and the ability to use that desktop... game over.
The only communication channel that works for everyone is telephone. SMS as well, mostly. If I asked my family to install Wire ... no chance. I'm glad that most of them have been persuaded by myself and my brother to install Threema. Took long enough. No way am I going to bring up yet another one.
Curious to hear how your miraculous grandma managed to get 50+ people on Wire ...
@Mr_Teatime @zeh @jgoerzen She didn't get everyone on Wire because she still reaches most people from her landline. She can't reach everyone with her landline though because overseas calls are still very pricey. If she had to use Wire for everyone, she could because unlike Signal, Wire excludes no one except those with neither a mobile phone or a desktop.
@jgoerzen @zeh @Mr_Teatime She probably has a couple friends her age who have only a landphone & no desktop, only reachable by landphone. But landphone alone doesn't reach everyone. Landphones are pricey for overseas calls & calling me would be a hassle (she would have to leave a msg for me to call her since my # is v/m only, then I would have to call her back over a VOIP phone & hope she hears the ringer).
So ... how inclusive does that make you, not even being prepared to receive a phone call from your dear granny?
We do have a landline number (using VoIP, as most are these days) for the express purpose of calling our families who live in different countries, and receiving calls from them. Costs 15€/month, for free EU-wide calls, which is less than a lot of people pay for mobile data.
@Mr_Teatime @zeh @jgoerzen Inclusivity came up in the context of the grandma use case. I am not a grandma & with my wildly different situation with security parameters, I am very far from inclusive. I have a vm-fax-only # & a non-DID VOIP acct. Intl outbound is cheap w/the VOIP acct but only vm-fax is reachable from POTS/VOIP/GSM. Even if I had a DID it would only give cheap calls to initiators in 1 region.
@jgoerzen @zeh @Mr_Teatime There are people who would like to reach me on #Facebook, but I exclude them deliberately. Giving people a way to reach me through FB is to facilitate FB. I will not do that. If they want to reach me, they must use a secure & free-world-respecting option. Signal is a non-starter; it brings in several forms of surviellance. My ethics & security needs are very different than grandmas.
»Signal is a non-starter; it brings in several forms of surviellance.«
Please elaborate.
Last time I checked, all they have is your identifer (i.e. phone number) and the date of the last time you used the service:
https://signal.org/bigbrother/eastern-virginia-grand-jury/
Compared to that, Wire holds tons more user data:
https://wire.com/en/security/
https://wire-docs.wire.com/download/Wire+Privacy+Whitepaper.pdf
(profile picture, group memberships; start/end time and members of group chats ...) Not sure if they require e-mail addresses
@Mr_Teatime @zeh @jgoerzen See https://github.com/privacytoolsIO/privacytools.io/issues/779. #Signal drags users into several surveillance systems needlessly. Mobile phones are tracked in the US & that data is openly sold. Most Europeans must register their SIM cards & show state-issued ID. Signal subjects people to Google's privacy abusing system by pushing users into Playstore & the code uses reCAPTCHA.
My SIM card is linked to a throwaway e-mail adress, my phone runs Lineage OS without Google apps.
I downloaded the SIgnal APK directly from their site, not through the playstore, because I have no Google account.
Almost all private desktop computers run Windows 10 now, which tries hard to apply similar levels of surveillance as mobile phones.
So, while "I don't use smartphones because they spy on me" is a valid argument, the gap to desktops is closing fast.
The obvious reply to that would be "just use Linux" -- but using Linux is still sadly not for everyone, and while installing LineageOS is a bit harder than Llinux, using it is just as easy as regular Android.
I say this as someone whose main computer runs on Linux for over 10 years.
@Mr_Teatime @jgoerzen @zeh Linux *is* for everyone. Some people will avoid it anyway but that's not your problem. The best you can do is make an effort to pursuay them away from the 1990s mentality that linux is user unfriendly. If a comms platform works on linux + all mainstream non-free OSs, what more can you ask? You could ask that support be dropped on non-free OSs but exclusivity is bad in this case.
@resist1984
I've been using Linux in some form or anotjer since 1999, and I'm really happy with Manjaro on my laptop, but I would not ever suggest to a non-technical user to just go and put it on their only computer, particularly not if I don't want to provide them regular tech support.
It's fine for those willing and able to invest the time/attention, but not otherwise. There's still way to much "if you don't know Bash you're to dumb" mentality in the community
@jgoerzen @zeh
@resist1984 @jgoerzen @zeh
As someone else once said: "I want my brain surgeon to think about brain surgery, not memorize commandline syntax or deal with upstream bug reports"
It's getting better, but not across the board, and not enough for "everyone". Yet. Hopefully
@Mr_Teatime @jgoerzen @zeh Yes, it is possible to travel to a country that has burner phones, use cash to buy a burner chip if you can find an unsurveilled shop that sells them, find an unsurvielled allyway to register to Signal, and throw the chip away. And after all that effort to go through hoops you shouldn't, you've still only given yourself privacy not the normies you will talk to who won't do that.
@zeh @jgoerzen @Mr_Teatime And even after that, if the country you bought the sim in is the US, you've still financially supported a corporation that sells customer location data & exploits all mobile data they get. You have to ask yourself, do you want privacy-for-me like US republicans and their me-first individualism, or do you want privacy-for-all? You don't install Signal to talk to yourself.
@Mr_Teatime @jgoerzen @zeh When choosing a means of communication, it's important to consider what your choice subjects others to. I had a LinkedIn acct before MS acquired it, so I was grandfathered and didn't have to supply a mobile phone# to MS. But others will be forced to share their ph#. From a privacy-for-all pov, I can't be the bait by which others are forced into disclosure, so I closed my acct.
@zeh @jgoerzen @Mr_Teatime The Signal APK download is hidden. People in-the-know pass that link around but the masses of normies that visit the Signal website can only find the Playstore link that OWS urges them to use. Even security experts won't know about the APK download unless it occurs to them to search the web for it, which is unlikely because it's atypical.
@Mr_Teatime @jgoerzen @zeh You can side-load the app for all your friends, but your friends have other friends. Signal distribution is designed so that moxie will get his stats. The Playstore download proliferates; the APK direct download does not.
@resist1984
Well done!
I was on the fence about LinkedIn, almost made an account several times but then abandoned the plan when MS took over. They were data harvesting before, but there's no way that wasn't going to get much worse with MS.
That's what concerns me about Wite, too: They've taken VC money, so they will try to sell to one of the big 5 sooner or later.
@jgoerzen @zeh
Those normies already have a smartphone and have no problem using Whatsapp and the Google Play store. For them, getting Signal the same way and instantly being ready to talk to me is orders of magnitudes faster than obtaining a desktop client, signing up for some account, remembering the password (or hear me yap about Keepass), and set everything up, and it's a huge improvement over Whatsapp.
And I have the link to the apk stored and distribute it liberally :)
@jgoerzen @zeh
@jgoerzen @zeh @Mr_Teatime Compare that to Wire, which does not impose whole systems of surveillance like that inherent with mobile phones. The metadata is not ideal, but usernames can be whatever you choose & IP address is not collected. The email address can trivially be a throwaway & normies are more inclined to use a throwaway email than go through the hoops getting a burner phone for Signal.