Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption • Hacker News Board

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#81

Post by flipbrad » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:20 AM UTC

jb_007 wrote: post #77

A noob question, how does signal know/prevent use of its app for illegal/criminal activities? Larger question here would be - Do governments and security agencies need to keep a tab on social media to check for illegal activities

Illegal under which laws. Qatari law, which outlaws homosexuality? Russian law, which prohibits referring to the "invasion" of Ukraine? Or do you assume everyone around the world is subject to US law, so it's fine for all our messages to be intercepted and checked for compliance with US law?

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#82

Post by FortiDude » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:21 AM UTC

DocTomoe wrote: post #40

shauryamanu wrote: post #14

Why doesn't govt improve its own machinery instead of trying to spy on its citizens? Do they think this way they'll improve the society? Like China?

The first function of a state is to ensure the continued existence of the state. Which is threatened a lot more by civil uprisings as compared to an external actor, especially in a time when international relations are relatively stable (current security events being the formerly-normal that is today's extreme). Another "storm on the Capitol" is so much more damaging to the US as it exists today as compared to a bord…

The state wouldn't fear civil uprising if it made its citizens' lives half decent

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#83

Post by UltraViolence » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:21 AM UTC

Signal is too small a player and is therefore more likely to be bullied by governments. India is taking pot shots at it to see if it can get away with forcing them into intercepting communications. If they leave as a result, they'll simply shrug and move on.

Also, I'm convinced that if Signal were to become popular they'd probably sell it to some commercial provider, since the cost of maintaining a service used by hundreds of millions if not billions is extremely expensive.

WhatsApp is an entirely different matter. Hundreds of millions of Indians probably use it and if the company were to suspend service because the Indian government mandated a backdoor all hell would break loose!

For the same reason both Australia and the UK haven't as of yet forced WhatsApp to install a backdoor, even though legislation forcing them to do so is already in place there.

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#84

Post by avidiax » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:22 AM UTC

wiseowise wrote: post #57

ls15 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd assume that India has its fair share of smart people who are able to spot fallacious rhetorics and want to see the bank accounts of officials in return.

Smart people don’t dictate things, majority does.

Who is "smarter", the people that manipulate both their philosophy and the majority's opinion to suit their goals, or the people who's smart philosophies are uncompromised but unimplemented?

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#85

Post by atoav » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:22 AM UTC

hunglee2 wrote: post #63

Big govt vs big tech, a battle that is being played out all over the world. Any country that value sovereignty and sees itself as an independent actor rather than a vassal state, must take the position India is taking, or else be susceptible to foreign owned apps influencing its citizenry. The only alternative would be to insist Signal hire its security agents into product / moderator roles, so that oversight can be…

Two mathematicians could literraly communicate encrypted on a piece of paper, and there would be no way to stop them other than scaring them put of doing it with threats of violence, jail or similar.

There is an aspect ro this we have to acknowledge: we live in a world where everybody who knows how can create encrypted communications that are impossible or at least very costly to break. You cannot stop them from doing it.

If we ban that kind of communications, the only persons making use of it will be people who really have something to hide. Criminals, drug cartels, financial fraudsters, terrorists and the likes. Which also means they are the only ones who got to get safe communication channels.

Banning a safe and private way to communicate for billions of people because of some criminals that you cannot deal with is very bad deal to strike. The way I see it criminals most of the time have to interface with the real, physical world in some places and that's were you would catch them if that was your goal: money transactions, buying selling things, shipping, production, etc. Hell if you check any police report ever this is where they catch the people.

That makes you wonder if banning encrypted communications for a whole population is not rather a thing you do for politicial (power) considerations.

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#86

Post by ilyt » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:24 AM UTC

hunglee2 wrote: post #63

Big govt vs big tech, a battle that is being played out all over the world. Any country that value sovereignty and sees itself as an independent actor rather than a vassal state, must take the position India is taking, or else be susceptible to foreign owned apps influencing its citizenry. The only alternative would be to insist Signal hire its security agents into product / moderator roles, so that oversight can be…

... so you're saying any country that is independent must violate basic human rights to privacy ?

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#87

Post by sroussey » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:27 AM UTC

UltraViolence wrote: post #83

Signal is too small a player and is therefore more likely to be bullied by governments. India is taking pot shots at it to see if it can get away with forcing them into intercepting communications. If they leave as a result, they'll simply shrug and move on. Also, I'm convinced that if Signal were to become popular they'd probably sell it to some commercial provider, since the cost of maintaining a service used by hu…

How do you know that there is not a back door in WhatsApp?

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#88

Post by avidiax » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:28 AM UTC

NavinF wrote: post #32

alxmng wrote: post #18

How is Signal tied to the region? What does it mean to “exit” India, exactly?

It means they'll get banned from the app stores and have their server IPs blackholed.

This is one of the pro/cons of trusting a messaging service from one of the big internet players. Sure Google/Facebook are profit-seeking enterprises, and won't put everything on the line for a privacy promise.

However neither of those companies is terribly easy to just blackhole. You can blackhole some IPs, but you'll also be causing your own business and government endless technical headaches since those IPs also serve local ads, shared folders and documents, government outreach channels, cloud services, etc.

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#89

Post by ilyt » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:30 AM UTC

jb_007 wrote: post #77

A noob question, how does signal know/prevent use of its app for illegal/criminal activities? Larger question here would be - Do governments and security agencies need to keep a tab on social media to check for illegal activities

> A noob question, how does signal know/prevent use of its app for illegal/criminal activities?

If you allow for privacy you allow for illegal usage. There is no way around it.

> Larger question here would be - Do governments and security agencies need to keep a tab on social media to check for illegal activities

They can do it old fashioned way. Also every compromise on security can be used by bad actors as well, and in some cases government is that bad actor, even in 1st world countries.

Re: Signal says it won’t compromise on encryption

#90

Post by black3r » Thu, Oct 27, 2022, 7:32 AM UTC

jorvi wrote: post #24

kornhole wrote: post #2

People act when on the precipice. Decentralized e2ee messengers and servers will thrive now in India: xmpp, matrix, session, tox, briar, Jami..

Or they’ll just install the .apk directly? iPhone users are screwed until sideloading becomes a thing, but iPhones represent a tiny market share in India, AFAIK

Sideloading on iPhones is already possible, but requires a Mac/PC and is limited for people without paid developer account (max. 3 apps, must reinstall every 7 days, there are windows/mac apps which do it for you automatically). with paid developer account you can sideload unlimited apps and they last a year... If you're interested, check out AltStore, or Sideloadly...