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Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

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Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#361

Post by franga2000 »

chmod775 wrote: post #17

Why can't they just ship signal with a Tor client? This is precisely what Tor was built for. They can donate some money to charities running Tor nodes while they're at it, or run some themselves. Iran tried to censor Tor too, but it's pretty much impossible to do so fully. At least the Tor devs are usually on top of it, while Signal is inexperienced dealing with things like this.

Of course it's hard to censor Tor, but is it really hard to outright block it? Last time I looked into it, you could just fetch the list of edge nodes that have to be public by design and block all of those.

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#362

Post by icare_1er »

The future is in initiatives like these... examples here and there show that the internet is way to vulnerable to censorhip (China, Twitter and AWS in the US, Iran, etc...). I hope the push for de-centralized platforms will expand. Well done Signal.

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#363

Post by harg »

TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #83
harg wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If all the traffic going via the proxies is e2e encrypted is there much that can happen?

But the fact that you are in Iran and using Signal may get you added to a watchlist. They can trace the IP addresses connecting to the proxy server back to a household or phone, no?

I don't think Iran is as oppressive a regime as you make it out to be. AFIAK the act of using (or attempting to use) Signal is not illegal. The resources required to trace an IP and track down the user simply because they used a messaging app seems unfeasable. Not to mention IP addresses on mobile devices are highly dynamic especially if you're jumping between wifi and cellular. Correct me if I'm wrong but I think in practice it's pretty hard to link IP addresses to actual individuals.

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#364

Post by vaduz »

greysonp wrote: post #338
josephg wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear about the threat vector, there's also nothing stopping signal from doing the same if they wanted to. Its impossible to tell if the version of signal you download from the app store is unmodified from the code you can find on github. I trust signal more than I trust facebook, but if you use signal, even though its opensource you still have to trust them not to put anything funky in the binary they upload t…

Hi there, Signal Android dev here. We have reproducible build steps, so you actually can verify the code is the same :) https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/tree/master/repr...

Reproducible builds do not help to determine if the version you download via the Play Store (or, for those on enterprise devices, any pre-installed corporate stores) is the same as you build - Play Store presents no real means to verify that. This includes any auto-updates if they are enabled.

It's an issue with Play Store as a delivery channel, the individual app in question can't do much about that.

Reproducible builds help if you: - download the APK separately (includng from the Signal website, or some of the other sources) - install the file locally via sideload - disable updates (!)

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#365

Post by doublestandard2 »

Krasnol wrote: post #350
doublestandard2 wrote: post #236

It's an irony how American companies try circumvents another country's law (regardless of whether you call it censorship or not, it is still a law) and boast about it. Yet, in the US these companies help the mainstream narrative to enforce censorship by banning (Google and Apple App market) or simply not offering other point of views basic hosting services (AWS). I am an Iranian and don't agree with all of our govern…

> Yet, in the US these companies help the mainstream narrative to enforce censorship by banning Why THESE companies? Where did Signal do this? Or are all US companies the same entity to you?

I describe my sentiment more precisely. By "these companies" I refer to entities or even individuals who take a very simplistic view toward this issue (Blocking of Signal by Iranian government).

In this simplistic viewpoint, issues in 3rd world countries (even this naming is condescending) are assumed to be evident. In this case an evil government versus oppressed people who can not even communicate with each other freely. So 'we' good people must help these poor people against their oppressive government.

This is in contrast to a much more nuanced view of the issues in the west. End-to-end encryption is a debated issue in the US and EU and legislators have proposed laws to ban it or enforcing other mechanisms to circumvent by law enforcement such as backdoors.

I mentioned the US as an example, because of Signal is operating under US jurisdiction. Moreover, the recent events in the US demonstrated that how a supposedly stable democracy is vulnerable to chaos. In this situation the tech companies decided to limit the communication of people or access to their platform for the greater good (according to them). I am not stating whether this is good or bad. I just want to point out that the issue is complex, nuanced and needs debate in the society. Keep in mind that the US is a superpower surrounded by two oceans and two friendly countries and has no serious external threat.

This is in contrast to Iran which is in a chaotic region and surrounded by the US military bases. It has suffered wars and coup in its recent history. It is currently under harsh economic sanctions with a possible goal of people revolting. The Iranian government has reasons to be paranoid and fearful that Signal can be used to organize violent demonstration. They cannot even demand information regarding criminal cases such as drug trafficking from these tech companies.

In the US the decision of giving access to tools and platforms is out-sourced to companies but in most part of the world governments make these kind of policies (again not necessarily good or bad).

I don't have a solution to these problems and I am not trying to say that we have an equivalence here. What I am expecting is a more nuanced and sophisticated perspective toward the issue.

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#366

Post by mmc4444 »

franga2000 wrote: post #359
shervin01 wrote: post #134

Hi, from Iran with love! First of all, thank you moxie and signal team for this proxy. Until 2018, many Iranians used telegram but Iran's regime after Russia blocked this messenger. telegram released mtproxy and this proxy was helpful. Russia lifted the ban on telegram but this app is still blocked on my country. but with VPNs, many iranians still use this app. after 2018, second most popular messaging app in iran wa…

I'm surprised Tor isn't blocked, since it's pretty easy to block it, but if it's not, you can always tunnel your entire phone through Tor, which would include Signal. Do keep in mind, that depending on your threat model, you might want to separate your apps across multiple devices or at least accounts (I mean like Android user accounts), so only some go through Tor (see the Silk Road case for why), but that also equa…

> so only some go through Tor (see the Silk Road case for why), but that also equally applies to VPNs.

Can you explain this?

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#367

Post by 2cb »

Havoc wrote: post #303

Does this potentially proxy other stuff too? I’ve got a couple of idle servers but don’t want mystery stuff proxied. Ie open to other traffic

It only allows a whitelist of Signal related URLs, nothing else.

See here in the code:

https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-TLS-Proxy/blob/master/da...

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#368

Post by ryanlol »

swebs wrote: post #356
ryanlol wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you call “defending censorship” is perhaps better described as “defending free speech”. Forced speech is not free speech.

Stong disagree. When a handful of tech companies that form an Oligarchy on modern communication decide to systemically oppress members of one political party, that's the antithesis of free speech.

Lets not pretend that this has anything to do with their political party.

Would you also say that tech companies banning ISIS is systematically oppressing members of one religion?

> that's the antithesis of free speech

It’s not. Companies enjoy freedom of speech too, but you’d force them to publish content they don’t want to publish. That’s the antithesis of free speech.

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#369

Post by cryo »

kdunglas wrote: post #237
kelnos wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it seems they've fixed the issue, without any kind of public comment.... still not great: https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-TLS-Proxy/commit/39a97da...

I (partially) fixed this issue, and I'm not affiliated in any way with Signal. It's public ( https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-TLS-Proxy/pull/2 ), and it looks like they welcome contributions, because they merged mine.

Wouldn't it be saner to also verify the downloaded archive hash? It looks like the domain resolving of nginx.org is trusted without doubt.

Re: Help users in Iran reconnect to Signal

#370

Post by Siira »

stunt wrote: post #238

So their government is blocking Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Telegram, Signal, BBC, CNN, Netflix, and probably many other social and media platforms. Meanwhile we are blocking Iranians to access Docker, Slack, Gitlab, Google Code, Github(Github until recently), Paypal, Apple Store, Play Store, AWS, Coursera, Adobe, Nvidia, AVG, Avast, Symantec, McAfee, Matlab!!, Oracle and many more. It should be really fun to use Int…

Netflix even blocks VPS IPs, to enforce their regional locks or something.
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