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On Privacy versus Freedom

matrix.org

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Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#41

Post by giancarlostoro »

Jerry2 wrote: post #25

I saw Moxie Marlinspike's talk when it was posted on CCC's official channel [1] and was disgusted by it. The talk has been now censored and video was made private. It was one of the most defeatist talks I've ever come across when it comes to messaging and privacy. His message was basically that anything you do is pointless and that his and WhatsApp/Facebook's way is the right one. I've used Signal on few occasions in…

Wire seemed like a decent alternative where you're not required a number, I think only an email. Also you can delete your account.

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#42

Post by dublinben »

ksbakan wrote: post #8

I won't touch signal because I care about user freedom more than privacy. (Both are important) No 3rd party clients, mandatory updates, mandatory google play services, and mobile only are all deal breakers.

Google Play Services obviously aren't required to run Signal on iOS.

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#43

Post by dane-pgp »

arusahni wrote: post #21
d33 wrote: post #18

> Moxie didn’t want the 36C3 talk recorded Curious why. Anyway it's there: https://peertube.co.uk/videos/watch/12be5396-2a25-4ec8-a92a-...

Here's his reasoning: https://twitter.com/moxie/status/1211443530335281153

To save people a click, here is a line taken ironically out of context:

"I have less faith in the internet as a place where a conversation can happen, and the timelessness of it decontextualizes."

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#44

Post by codezero »

rumanator wrote: post #28
thesorrow wrote: post #3

Email is flawed and will become a one way protocol to receive spam, newsletters and invoices just like paper mail. I think Matrix is our second chance to build a secure federated communication suite. So far it's going in the right direction...

> Email is flawed and will become a one way protocol to receive spam, newsletters and invoices just like paper mail. I don't recall the last time I've received spam in my email inbox among the tens of emails I've receive daily, and newsletters/invoices are messages that users intend to subscribe. You might argue that instant messaging scratches an itch that email doesn't, but that's a bit shortsighted and doesn't mak…

Agreed. Fifteen year ago I set up an email system that let me give everyone a different email, depending on what service it was/when, and since then I've only had my email clearly sold off to a third party that spammed me once. It was a startup that got bought by a private equity firm (and is still around) and fwiw, after I unsubscribed from the first spam I got, it stopped...

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#45

Post by cren »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #41
Jerry2 wrote: post #25

I saw Moxie Marlinspike's talk when it was posted on CCC's official channel [1] and was disgusted by it. The talk has been now censored and video was made private. It was one of the most defeatist talks I've ever come across when it comes to messaging and privacy. His message was basically that anything you do is pointless and that his and WhatsApp/Facebook's way is the right one. I've used Signal on few occasions in…

Wire seemed like a decent alternative where you're not required a number, I think only an email. Also you can delete your account.

I read on a privacy-oriented website that Wire was purchased by an American company not trusted for its record on privacy (or perhaps it was that since the company is American, their data can be read by the US govt.). I can't find it now though. There isn't anything mentioning it on the website of `www.privacytools.io`: https://www.privacytools.io/software/real-time-communication...

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#46

Post by prophesi »

neilalexander wrote: post #6
tialaramex wrote: post #2

I think the timing makes Moxie's point very well without him saying a thing. All these years later Matrix only has... The ambition to some day try to offer the core privacy features Signal already delivered back then. Some of the most basic stuff is, you believe, almost kinda sorta done. This is, to be clear, much better than just sitting back insisting you were right but not lifting a finger. But for an actual user…

Building monoliths (like Signal) is easy and that's a core take-away point of Matthew's response in the blog post. Building Matrix is not and has not ever been a small task, but the effort gives us the freedom to run our own services and still be able to talk with our friends. Matrix is the "long game".

And it's a worthwhile pursuit. Moxie's points simply don't make sense, and are infuriating / disrespectful to those who are working on solving decentralization's issues.

_Of course_ it will be difficult. But the same argument could be made for building a completely unencrypted messenger app. You won't have to worry about managing keys, obfuscating metadata, or anything like that.

At the end of the day, it's about realizing the importance of both privacy _and_ decentralization that our current infrastructure threatens.

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#47

Post by daenney »

arusahni wrote: post #21
d33 wrote: post #18

> Moxie didn’t want the 36C3 talk recorded Curious why. Anyway it's there: https://peertube.co.uk/videos/watch/12be5396-2a25-4ec8-a92a-...

Here's his reasoning: https://twitter.com/moxie/status/1211443530335281153

> I just prefer to present something as part of a conversation that's happening in a place, rather than a webinar that I'm broadcasting forever to the world.

To me it sounds an awful lot like not wanting to be scrutinized or held accountable for what he says.

I also find this rather disappointing as it excludes anyone who is unable, for whatever reason, to be at his talks from hearing what he has to say. Given how influential he's been in this domain, this sadness me quite a bit.

> I have less faith in the internet as a place where a conversation can happen

This feels a bit ironic, given he's built an enterprise on enabling conversations to happen on the internet, though arguably only with a limited set of people.

> , and the timelessness of it decontextualizes.

Not quite sure what that's supposed to mean. Perhaps it's a language barrier thing, but I can't parse that into something sensible.

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#48

Post by SamWhited »

"Democracy and republics are hard, so we should all just give up and have autocratic governments"

It may sound flippant or unrelated, but I think this extreme projection of his argument makes it evident how silly it is. This is one of the reasons I switched away from using Signal, as much as I'd like better privacy on my text messages it's not worth handing that much control over to someone I shouldn't have to put my trust in. Instead I do my text messages over Jabber/XMPP with jmp.chat now and for others who have a proper XMPP address I use that (which gives me the option of OMEMO encryption which is basically the XMPP version of the signal double ratchet).

For the average user, installing conversations.im and hitting "create account" or whatever and calling it a day is good enough, so it's not even significantly harder than dealing with Signal.

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#49

Post by tialaramex »

Arathorn wrote: post #5
tialaramex wrote: post #2

I think the timing makes Moxie's point very well without him saying a thing. All these years later Matrix only has... The ambition to some day try to offer the core privacy features Signal already delivered back then. Some of the most basic stuff is, you believe, almost kinda sorta done. This is, to be clear, much better than just sitting back insisting you were right but not lifting a finger. But for an actual user…

> Some of the most basic stuff is, you believe, almost kinda sorta done. The core Matrix stuff has been usable for years, and in many ways you've had better metadata and censorship protection available than Signal - given you have the option of running your own server which could be entirely off the grid, and used only for your own conversations. However, if your point is that Matrix focuses on freedom as well as pri…

No, a hypothetical option to never communicate with anybody on the network isn't "better protection" in any meaningful sense than a system designed from the outset to actually protect you when you communicate with other people.

When you say we're trying to improve I want to believe you. When you stubbornly declare "we're better" in "many ways" while actually being much worse, what could I conclude? Only that your goal is to deceive people because you're not really interested in improving. Blergh.

Back in February 2015 you did not understand the gravity of the mistake in leaving end-to-end encryption as a TODO item for Matrix and defended this decision as "Pragmatic" repeatedly. Matrix itself is a bit older, mid-2014 I think, but 2015 was the first time I ran into the arguments for Matrix. It's important to underscore those dates. I've moaned (including to his face) about Tim's choice not to do encryption out of the box in his toy hypermedia system, but that was almost 25 years earlier and whilst annoying a lot more understandable. 2014 on the other hand is after BCP #188 ("Pervasive Monitoring Is An Attack") and all that implies so there are no excuses. Matrix was a defective design on day zero. 2020 begins with a promise that it'll be fixed soon, kinda, sorta and then a retreat to old arguments about how it's all worth it for "freedom".

When I say "kinda sorta done" I am not referring to being able to send unprotected plaintext over the Internet in 2020. What's "kinda sorta done" is the basic task of sending messages between participants without anybody else knowing what was said, or preferably who by and who to. It sounds like Matrix's _ambition_ is still that in 2020 this will be the case for certain groups of participants, at least some of the time. Not everybody, and not all the time, and not yet unless you go out of your way which we know users will not do.

Re: On Privacy versus Freedom

#50

Post by tzs »

nirs wrote: post #24
ex3ndr wrote: post #14

When i asked if i could use his libraries in ios/android apps Moxie refused. He licensed them under GPL that prohibits distributing of software via app stores. Quite a strange for a guy who claim that he wants to spread encryption. Sure, but only on your own platform. Fastforward he sold such rights for a whatsapp. Just simple business, nothing about privacy itself.

Can you explain how GPL prohibits distribution via app stores?

Generally, the way app stores work is that the developer uploads a copy of the app to the app store, and then the app store makes and distributes copies of that for people that request the app.

Note that since it is the app store making those copies for end users, the app store needs permission of the copyright owner to do so. There will be something in the agreement between the app developer and the app store that says that the developer grants such permission when the developer submits the app.

For app code whose copyright is actually owned by the developer, that's all that is necessary. The developer is able to grant all the necessary permissions to the app store.

If the app contains code that the developer does not own, then the app store also needs permission from the owner of that code in order to make and distribute copies of the app.

Consider a developer who includes someone else's GPL code in their app. To be able to make and distribute copies of it, the app store is going to have to obey GPL.

Most app stores require downloaders to agree to a license agreement with the app store, which typically includes things like prohibiting reverse engineering and prohibiting reselling or making and distributing copies.

GPL, however, prohibits such restrictions. If you impose such restrictions, GPL does not give you copyright permission to make and distribute copies. This makes the app store license and GPL incompatible, and so the software cannot be distributed on the store.

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