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WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

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Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#101

Post by hornokpleas »

PennRobotics wrote: post #83
invalidname wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. But the whatsapp groups are impossible to move. I created the same group on signal. Nothing, two people move. Even in my office, a technocratic environment for sure... People won't move. We need a stronger motivator to move them or we need to make moving "seamless".

I chuckled when our daycare had a lengthy discussion about data privacy and, twenty minutes later, asked every parent to join the WA group.

In the Whatsapp group, you don't have to share anything about yourself or your child that you don't want to. The daycare might only post very generic info about opening times, events, etc, or it might be one used only for parents to communicate among themselves, at their option.

Facebook know who is in the group and what they post but none of it is necessarily confidential information.

On the other hand, the daycare as part of their operations know lots of details of your children's development, health issues, allergies, mental health, educational attainment and special needs. They know if you are getting divorced, who has custody, if there are dangerous people in the child's life and so on.

Is keeping this private really in the same ballpark as choosing to have a WA group or not?

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#102

Post by nyuszika7h »

GekkePrutser wrote: post #70
entropicgravity wrote: post #45

I dumped WhatsApp within a few days of when FB said they would be changing how whatsapp deals with user privacy. A lot of other people did too. I'm happily now on Telegram.

Telegram is now going to force ads and block apps that don't show them.. And their chats are not even E2E encrypted except their 'secret chats' but they work only on one device and don't work in groups.

I don't like ads either, but they're only going to be in channels, not in groups and private conversations. And if someone really wants to block ads, there are alternatives:

* Build and install a custom client with your own API key, and don't share it with anyone

* Use an Xposed module (already exists) or Cydia tweak if you're willing to root/jailbreak your phone

As for the encryption, it depends on your threat model. Yes, full E2E by default would be ideal, but even with their default cloud encryption they're probably a lot more trustable than Facebook & co. According to their FAQ, the data is scattered across servers in multiple jurdistictions, so a lot of governments would have to team up to get any data out of them.

But also, how do you handle convenient cloud backup/sync with full E2E? WhatsApp and Viber both constantly manage to lose messages for me when restoring after a device reset or switch.

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#103

Post by EMM_386 »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #44
zaptheimpaler wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sometimes wonder whether there is any purpose to it in the long term. If/when Signal becomes big enough to be used by a lot of people, they will want to monetize too and the governments will become interested in monitoring messages there too. It just feels futile. As long as companies need to turn a profit and governments can surreptitiously surveil their citizens there's no long-term solution. We can move to the n…

A decentralised, trustless future perhaps? I'm semi-conspiratorial, semi-fatalistic about society's ability to change politics politically / non-technically. There are too many who are too apathetic (and I might even be one of them by already being semi-fatalistic) that anchor the current system in perpetuity. My conspiratorial side says this is by design, whilst my fatalistic side says it's human nature (essentially…

> There are too many who are too apathetic. Revolutionary change is often a case of "it" getting (a lot) worse before it gets better, but with the inevitability of returning to the previous status quo just with different bums on the same seats.

The problem with this is that you have far too many keyboard warriors who read clickbait headlines and decide they want to change the system.

The people actually working in that system have decades of knowledge about how it works. That isn't always a bad thing. They may understand how to navigate a complex system to get the real change you want, to actually happen.

Imagine if people in this "decentralized, trustless future" saw a YouTube video of an aircraft landing and came to the conclusion that they didn't use enough rudder on landing, without understanding the nature of a 25 knot crosswind.

They'd vote, the pilots would be fired, and aviation safety would drop another notch because the people voting didn't understand the scope of what they were voting on, because they weren't trained pilots.

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#104

Post by DeathArrow »

Instead of arguing how bad WhatsApp is in terms of privacy, people would be better off by switching to more privacy respecting alternatives such as Telegram or Signal.

I know it's hard to switch if most of your friends are on WhatsApp, but you can talk to them and switch together.

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#105

Post by fsflover »

mattowen_uk wrote: post #86
philliphaydon wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's App is not secure.

Not true. WhatsApp uses the same E2E encryption as Signal. The only place it doesn't use it, is when you are talking to WhatsApp Business users, as the business API needs access to the messages.

> WhatsApp uses the same E2E encryption as Signal.

Did you see the source code? Or do you trust Facebook?

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#106

Post by moring »

DeathArrow wrote: post #104

Instead of arguing how bad WhatsApp is in terms of privacy, people would be better off by switching to more privacy respecting alternatives such as Telegram or Signal. I know it's hard to switch if most of your friends are on WhatsApp, but you can talk to them and switch together.

Back when ICQ was a thing, alternatives like Pidgin encouraged switching by connecting to the existing ICQ network. I understand that in the case of WhatsApp, connecting to the existing network means that FB still gets hold of your data so there is no improvement in terms of privacy (at first), but it is still a step forward if convincing your friends to all switch at once is not an option (which is impossible -- your friends have friends that are not your friends, so the whole world would have to switch at once).

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#107

Post by maltalex »

ciex wrote: post #92
maltalex wrote: post #88

This thread is full of people suggesting to just switch everyone, including grandma, to Signal/Matrix/Telegram/XMPP . This is naive. First of all, I'm a big fan of Signal and Matrix, but it is hard to overstate how much more polished WhatsApp is in comparison. There's just a lot more friction for grandma. There are also considerably fewer resources behind the alternatives, so things like this [0] happen (tl;dr - it t…

Reading this as an argument that more resources means bugs are fixed quicker I have to disagree, [there's][0] [many][1] [examples][2] of big bucks software productions with notable long-lived bugs in production. [0]: https://www.socmedsean.com/solved-how-do-i-clear-the-faceboo... [1]: https://www.techradar.com/news/ios-15-beta-still-hasnt-fixed... [2]: https://www.reddit.com/r/beta/search?q=video+player&restrict...

Fair point. To be honest, I hope that such a bug could have remained open for 7 months because of insufficient resources. Any other explanation is even worse.

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#108

Post by selestify »

rakoo wrote: post #89
PennRobotics wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I chuckled when our daycare had a lengthy discussion about data privacy and, twenty minutes later, asked every parent to join the WA group.

I joined a few orgs fighting for a systemic change, understanding the decisions process and be a part of it, more collective life in support of all the discriminated people and a more ecological way of life. Left-leaning stuff. All the public communication happens on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Private comms are on whatever those platforms have, or Telegram and Discord. Only a minority have Signal and most don't…

> I joined a few orgs fighting for a systemic change, understanding the decisions process and be a part of it, more collective life in support of all the discriminated people and a more ecological way of life. Left-leaning stuff.

That's fascinating, because when I joined similar groups last year, they all emphasized using Signal for private comms. They were, in fact, the only people I talked to Singal on, because nobody else I knew really used the app back then.

Perhaps there's a stronger privacy culture in some activist groups versus others.

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#109

Post by oblio »

indigo945 wrote: post #69
philliphaydon wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's App is not secure.

This is not true, unlike Telegram, WhatsApp has a reasonable model for E2EE and it's enabled by default. The UI is lackluster and it really should scream more when contacts' public keys change (to prevent MITM attacks), and it doesn't protect metadata such as your contact list at all, but all of that is still better than Telegram, which offers no encryption for group chats at all.

> but all of that is still better than Telegram, which offers no encryption for group chats at all

I think Telegram (group) chats are encrypted, just not end to end.

Re: WhatsApp has removed answer to “how do I choose not to share data with FB”

#110

Post by MikusR »

philliphaydon wrote: post #81
indigo945 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not true, unlike Telegram, WhatsApp has a reasonable model for E2EE and it's enabled by default. The UI is lackluster and it really should scream more when contacts' public keys change (to prevent MITM attacks), and it doesn't protect metadata such as your contact list at all, but all of that is still better than Telegram, which offers no encryption for group chats at all.

> This is not true The fact that I recieve advertising in FB for things discussed in a 1:1 chat in whats app, minutes after discussing them, means it's not secure. E2E is end to end, not end to FB to end.

What keyboard are you using?
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