By stopping to use it.
Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
141–150 of 210 posts
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#142I have stopped communicating with friends and family who try communicating via insecure apps. I send a response saying I will only read Signal or similar messages from them. Some think this is a hardline, but my security is important to me, and true friends and family need to respect that. It's kind of like how my sister is vegan, so when she comes over for dinner, I cook vegan dishes for her. I respect and accommoda…
Does your family's threat model actually include targeted surveillance by US intelligence agencies? There are many reasons to switch off whatsapp, but I don't believe it should be considered insecure unless you are a journalist, activist, or citizen of a country with severe oppressive regimes: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Russia, etc. If your threat model DOES include US intelligence agencies, you shouldn't use…
> but I don't believe it should be considered insecure unless you are a journalist, activist, or citizen of a country with severe oppressive regimes: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Russia, etc.
If only those people will try to have privacy, it will be much easier to target them. Everyone should have privacy to protect them. It’s sort of like freedom of speech is necessary not just for journalists, but for everyone, even if you have nothing to say.
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#143It's very interesting that this is the 4th Anti-Whatsapp post on HN in the past 2 days. These posts seem to get a higher than normal amount of engagement also. weird.
With 2 billion+ users worldwide, it's not surprising that Facebook's move has caused which a stir
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
They don't have to store anything to make a good use of that data.
"The information we share with the other Facebook Companies. includes your account registration information (such as your phone number), transaction data, service-related information, information on how you interact with others (including businesses) when using our Services, mobile device information, your IP address, and may include other information identified in the Privacy Policy section entitled ‘Information We…
The very block of text you quoted is terrifying for me.
Why am I getting the impression there is no convincing you about how bad for our privacy this is?
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#145what I've found to be super helpful when communicating the importance of privacy to my less tech savvy friends and family, is communicating that I don't want to participate in services that ask me to sacrifice the details of my inner life, especially to companies that I feel are disrupting the health of society, and that is what I feel they are asking me to do when they prefer to use platforms supported by surveillance models, like Facebook and Google.
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#146Could a competitor with a subscription based business model sneak in and grab market share?
there are plenty trying.
I think most would be targeted at business professionals that need a certain level of privacy. I don't see how a service like that could win over enough domestic users to make a dent in the market while whilst the are so many free alternatives with great features
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#147I have stopped communicating with friends and family who try communicating via insecure apps. I send a response saying I will only read Signal or similar messages from them. Some think this is a hardline, but my security is important to me, and true friends and family need to respect that. It's kind of like how my sister is vegan, so when she comes over for dinner, I cook vegan dishes for her. I respect and accommoda…
Does your family's threat model actually include targeted surveillance by US intelligence agencies? There are many reasons to switch off whatsapp, but I don't believe it should be considered insecure unless you are a journalist, activist, or citizen of a country with severe oppressive regimes: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Russia, etc. If your threat model DOES include US intelligence agencies, you shouldn't use…
This is just a more convoluted "nothing to hide" argument.
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#148I think I started with my wife to test it out myself.
Then the younger ones. Started discussing it with my siblings, pointed out a number of ways in which Telegram was better, asked them if they really wanted to play into the hands of Facebook (this was before WhatsApp got E2E-encryption I think).
Same with my wifes family. With them they suddenly just jumped at it and switched one afternoon.
My family however took over a year I think until suddenly my until then deeply sceptical sister told everyone that she'd leave WhatsApp and those who wanted to be along should join her on Telegram. And I said nothing and was just happy.
Before and in between those two events everyone else changed:
- church groups
- sports groups
- all kinds of groups for planning and organizating all kinds of stuff
Some needed a little nudge, others went all by themselves.
At some point Telegram became so much better as to be contagious: I heard a number of people not wanting to leave WhatsApp but after they started to use Telegram nobody ever wanted to go back.
Long story short:
Start with close friends. Start it as an experiment. Start with the young ones, let them nag their parents and coaches and everyone to change :-)
(For those who don't know what I'm talking about: Telegram is extremely much more user friendly and powerful compared to WhatsApp in the same way WhatsApp was extremely much more user friendly and powerful than sms.)
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does your family's threat model actually include targeted surveillance by US intelligence agencies? There are many reasons to switch off whatsapp, but I don't believe it should be considered insecure unless you are a journalist, activist, or citizen of a country with severe oppressive regimes: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Russia, etc. If your threat model DOES include US intelligence agencies, you shouldn't use…
Add India to that list of regimes.
I don’t think so.
Re: Ask HN: How would you convince your friends and family to switch from WhatsApp?
#150I have stopped communicating with friends and family who try communicating via insecure apps. I send a response saying I will only read Signal or similar messages from them. Some think this is a hardline, but my security is important to me, and true friends and family need to respect that. It's kind of like how my sister is vegan, so when she comes over for dinner, I cook vegan dishes for her. I respect and accommoda…
Does your family's threat model actually include targeted surveillance by US intelligence agencies? There are many reasons to switch off whatsapp, but I don't believe it should be considered insecure unless you are a journalist, activist, or citizen of a country with severe oppressive regimes: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Russia, etc. If your threat model DOES include US intelligence agencies, you shouldn't use…
> If your threat model DOES include US intelligence agencies, you shouldn't use almost any mainstream browser, most protocols (including https://), social media (including HN), etc...
No, you can simply use Qubes OS and use whatever software you want in disposable VMs and perhaps have several identities. It works for me (or so I hope).