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Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

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Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#101

Post by grishka »

sjaak wrote: post #6
FreakyT wrote: post #5

The issue with Signal that annoys me most is the complete lack of any meaningful backup/export on iOS. I lost my entire chat history when I got a new phone because their bizarre "proximity based" solution failed.

Why is keeping a chat history important? I don't take notes of IRL conversation I have, they're ephemeral. Not trolling, honestly curious :-)

I just never delete messages. Chat histories are an integral part of my past, and my past is what makes me, me.

That said, I deleted my WhatsApp account today just because some organizations assumed that this was an acceptable and convenient way of reaching me if I gave them my phone number. Didn't use it much anyway.

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#102

Post by actuator »

antirez wrote: post #91
actuator wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding your other point, while you are theoretically right that this is a dangerous precedent. But I think this week's events were extraordinary. At the end of the day humans are running these platforms and it becomes very hard to ignore developments like these. As much as I love free speech we have seen throughout the world that there is a real human cost to not censoring these things.

I agree that it was extraordinary and extremely worrying, but: + Trump is not running out of channels to speak, just who supports him will believe he is censored and will develop a deeper attachment to him. Democracy works when you are able to understand somebody is fool even if you can read what they write. + Twitter censored his tweets partially even before what happened recently. When he claimed he didn't lost ele…

> Trump is not running out of channels to speak, just who supports him will believe he is censored and will develop a deeper attachment to him. Democracy works when you are able to understand somebody is fool even if you can read what they write.

Yeah, but what we have seen in social media is that the discourse gets polarized. Everyone hangs around in groups/channels/subreddits/blogs that are of the side they identify with. They are echo chambers which shape their own reality in many ways. So people often tend to believe one version of the events. Over the years we have seen fractures between ideologies grow deeper. So, I am not sure if this strategy works.

> This time we believe it was acceptable because our political views here in HN, mostly are aligned with the ones of folks running social platforms. Next time it may be different.

Completely agree on this. It is definitely dangerous.

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#103

Post by gshulegaard »

izacus wrote: post #46
_l4jh wrote: post #19

I have been using Signal for two years now and I love it. However I really, really hope they can work on a good backup and restore process as losing my message history because I have to reinstall the app on my desktop[1] or have to reset my phone is a horrible experience. Just build an encrypted blob and zip it up and pop it on my iCloud or Google Drive or leave it local and let me deal with it but I need something .…

> However I really, really hope they can work on a good backup and restore process as losing my message history because I have to reinstall the app on my desktop[1] or have to reset my phone is a horrible experience. I've tried to report bugs and talk to developers about this but there's one fundamental problem here - the Signal team fundamentally does not value chat history the same way a lot of people do. They thin…

I think it's astute of you to point out that the Signal developers do not value chat history the same way many people do, but I am not sure I track with this:

> It's not a technical issue - they just think you're wrong when you want to keep your conversations.

as much.

When you are treating security as a number one priority I think there are a lot of things that become technical issues which aren't typically. Transferring or backing up history between disparate devices, which become trusted at different times, is one of those things that I think _is_ difficult to do without sacrificing security.

For example, in the classic case when a user adds a new device and wants history to be available on both you can't let the devices controlled by one person simply sync with one another. To do so would be making a security concession to the other members of the chat in that they no longer verify every destination of their message. If you are unwilling to make a security concession everything in this area becomes magnitudes more difficult. I wouldn't say it is impossible, but it's definitely not trivial.

My gut reaction is also that it is difficult to _guarantee_ history in this type of security first mindset. If you add a new device and someone doesn't approve/verify/trade encryption keys with the additional client then there isn't much you can do besides not make that data available no? So I don't think it unreasonable for developers to hold the mindset that history is not a priority for a security first application.

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#104

Post by godelski »

upofadown wrote: post #79
izacus wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However I really, really hope they can work on a good backup and restore process as losing my message history because I have to reinstall the app on my desktop[1] or have to reset my phone is a horrible experience. I've tried to report bugs and talk to developers about this but there's one fundamental problem here - the Signal team fundamentally does not value chat history the same way a lot of people do. They thin…

>...the Signal team fundamentally does not value chat history the same way a lot of people do. Keeping around old messages more or less negates the value of forward secrecy. The Signal Protocol is obsessively forward secret. So it would be reasonable for those that have put so much work into getting rid of old messages for good would not value them.

Honestly I personally just want the ability to save specific messages. My friend sends me a recipe? Save. Just shooting the shit? Don't save. I don't understand why people want to save their whole chat history but I do understand why you'd want to save specific messages, and that's a big missing feature.

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#105

Post by dotdi »

antirez wrote: post #92
dotdi wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My dude, the new TOS stipulate that "you grant WhatsApp a royalty-free, transferable license to use, reproduce and derive works from data you upload, send, ..."[0], which makes no sense at all if WhatsApp/Facebook did not have a way to decrypt the things people send via WhatsApp. [0]: https://twitter.com/FSFTamilnadu/status/1346864102698754050

I think that the TOS is just terribly written and opaque, and that in the next weeks we will receive clarifications about the fact messages are protected. Otherwise if it will be the case that FB can read messages, the matter will be very different and I will agree on the switch. But so far to imply this looks far fetched.

Even without that, all the metadata which is now shared with FB and 𝙲̶𝚊̶𝚖̶𝚋̶𝚛̶𝚒̶𝚍̶𝚐̶𝚎̶ ̶𝙰̶𝚗̶𝚊̶𝚕̶𝚢̶𝚝̶𝚒̶𝚌̶𝚊̶ Friends is as sensitive as the actual transferred data. Contact lists and phone numbers are going to be correlated to Facebook profiles, messaging patterns mined, etc.

It's about time people rise up and oppose this exploitation.

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#106

Post by dragonwriter »

antirez wrote: post #91
actuator wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding your other point, while you are theoretically right that this is a dangerous precedent. But I think this week's events were extraordinary. At the end of the day humans are running these platforms and it becomes very hard to ignore developments like these. As much as I love free speech we have seen throughout the world that there is a real human cost to not censoring these things.

I agree that it was extraordinary and extremely worrying, but: + Trump is not running out of channels to speak, just who supports him will believe he is censored and will develop a deeper attachment to him. Democracy works when you are able to understand somebody is fool even if you can read what they write. + Twitter censored his tweets partially even before what happened recently. When he claimed he didn't lost ele…

> This time we believe it was acceptable because our political views here in HN, mostly are aligned with the ones of folks running social platform

There's different types of acceptable that get confused (for some people they may be equivalent, but the problem is that they fail to recognize that for other people they are distinct, and also that they fail to realize that making them equivalent is the essence of totalitarian control), specifically:

“Is it right that the private actor makes this decision?”

vs.

“Is it right that the private actor is free to make this decision?”

Twitter has made several curation decisions I thought were not acceptable in the first sense, because my political views are not aligned with Twitter's, such as deciding to lift the rules applicable to most participants from those that met a new leadership position test in response to widespread complaints about Trump’s routine violations early in its term.

But I don't find those decisions unacceptable in the second sense because I believe in freedom.of speech and the press, which exactly means that Twitter ought to be free to decide on what content it will carry, including whether and how to take the social position of the source of the content into account.

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#107

Post by josh2600 »

actuator wrote: post #64

This is blowing up quite big now and I have managed to shift a lot of my friends to Signal now, I wonder if WhatsApp will go back on its decision. As we stand now even Signal is not safe because of the business model. I wonder what's the model on messaging apps that will work. I don't want the OS creators to own the messaging platforms as well by virtue of subsidising it through OS/hardware.

Punchline: Whatsapp can't go back on their decision for a variety of reasons that are so much bigger than Whatsapp.

The revenue pressure from Apple cutting FB ad revenue due to nerfing tracking has forced FB's hand. They have to monetize Whatsapp.

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#108

Post by Evidlo »

_l4jh wrote: post #19

I have been using Signal for two years now and I love it. However I really, really hope they can work on a good backup and restore process as losing my message history because I have to reinstall the app on my desktop[1] or have to reset my phone is a horrible experience. Just build an encrypted blob and zip it up and pop it on my iCloud or Google Drive or leave it local and let me deal with it but I need something .…

Matrix has this. You can save your recovery key somewhere to recover your chats on a brand new device.

You can actually just use another logged-in device (e.g. your desktop) to recover your chats by scanning a QR code to trust the new device. Recovery key is just in case this isn't an option.

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#109

Post by tw04 »

upofadown wrote: post #79
izacus wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However I really, really hope they can work on a good backup and restore process as losing my message history because I have to reinstall the app on my desktop[1] or have to reset my phone is a horrible experience. I've tried to report bugs and talk to developers about this but there's one fundamental problem here - the Signal team fundamentally does not value chat history the same way a lot of people do. They thin…

>...the Signal team fundamentally does not value chat history the same way a lot of people do. Keeping around old messages more or less negates the value of forward secrecy. The Signal Protocol is obsessively forward secret. So it would be reasonable for those that have put so much work into getting rid of old messages for good would not value them.

It's not reasonable to expect it to be a defacto messenger if you can't save chat history. Full stop.

If I want a conversation to be private, I set expiring messages, for the rest of it, I want to be able to go back and reference things all the time. Whether it be digging up a song link I sent a buddy, or looking up the address someone sent me a week in advance.

If they can't operate or are unwilling to operate under those guidelines then they just aren't ever going to replace whatsapp with the general populace and the community should start work on something else or agree that telegram is "good enough" (I don't think it is).

Re: Signal WhatsApp Chats Import

#110

Post by jonahx »

sjaak wrote: post #6
FreakyT wrote: post #5

The issue with Signal that annoys me most is the complete lack of any meaningful backup/export on iOS. I lost my entire chat history when I got a new phone because their bizarre "proximity based" solution failed.

Why is keeping a chat history important? I don't take notes of IRL conversation I have, they're ephemeral. Not trolling, honestly curious :-)

> I don't take notes of IRL conversation I have, they're ephemeral.

Fairer analogy: If you could search transcripts of your IRL conversations at no additional cost (no notetaking), would you?

I think most people would say yes.

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