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Signal Introduces Stories

signal.org

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Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#221

Post by gwill »

Blahah wrote: post #26
Dylan16807 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making people juggle a different app for SMS is the opposite of being mainstream friendly.

I use signal for SMS. Is this an iOS thing? If so presumably it's an Apple restriction? edit: ah, they announced recently that they are removing SMS support in Android. The reasoning is solid IMO, I've accidentally sent insecure messages before.

how do you use it for sms on ios? their website says they don't support it. https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007321171-Ca...

Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#222

Post by stavros »

fitblipper wrote: post #199

I was worried about sharing broadly and leaking info from 1 contact to another, but it seems like the Signal team did all the right things here. When you create a story you can make it a group story or not. If you do not make it a group story, reactions and replies to stories get sent to you over your 1:1 chats and not shared across other recipients of the story. If you make it a group story, and share it with multip…

It seems to me that, under the hood, stories are implemented as simple messages. To publish a story to 200 friends, you just send 200 photo messages to them. Group stories are a group message (and hence separate per group), which is a very good abstraction.

Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#223

Post by kibwen »

fitblipper wrote: post #199

I was worried about sharing broadly and leaking info from 1 contact to another, but it seems like the Signal team did all the right things here. When you create a story you can make it a group story or not. If you do not make it a group story, reactions and replies to stories get sent to you over your 1:1 chats and not shared across other recipients of the story. If you make it a group story, and share it with multip…

I'm still of the opinion that encrypted private group chats are an impossible UX problem (1:1 chat is fine). But if I were to trust anyone to find a way to do it properly, it would be Signal.

Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#224

Post by kibwen »

1MachineElf wrote: post #174
Dylan16807 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making people juggle a different app for SMS is the opposite of being mainstream friendly.

On this new Google Pixel 7, the app launcher thing is limited to just 4 apps. Now that I can't use Signal for SMS, it has lost it's convenient spot on my home screen. I find myself using it less, so like you, I'm very displeased about their dropping SMS. The forum thread on Signal's Discourse about the change is full of snide remarks from their moderators, and it's extremely disappointing to see Signal community lead…

Conversely, when Signal drops support for SMS, I expect to stop messaging anyone still on SMS. So far it's been fairly painless getting the people I actually care about to switch, but YMMV. My mom doesn't care if she has to use a separate app to message me.

Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#225

Post by topdancing »

nicce wrote: post #172
Calvin02 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's accurate. Pretty sure both work the same way regarding metadata. Think about it: if Signal didn't know that A was messaging B, how would they route that message to B's phone? A has to be able to find B's ip address someway. B can't broadcast its ip address to all the Signal users -- that would be a huge security hole. It probably works like this: 1) A sends encrypted message + B's phone number to…

WhatsApp contact uplod mechanism continues here [1]. It means, that if the contact list contains numbers which have not accepted WhatsApp ToS, their content is stored only as hash. When the user starts using WhatsApp, their number and hash is being mapped. Vaguely described as > Each cryptographic hash value is stored on WhatsApp’s servers, linked to the WhatsApp users who uploaded the corresponding phone numbers bef…

> Signal does not know numbers or how these contatcs interact.

> It is described here [2]. Number is only needed for creating the unique hash. Server knows only the recipient, not the sender.

Signal does know everyone's numbers as everybody is logged into a Signal account on the server end (this is how your client fetches messages for your number). That same account and IP are also used when you send a message.

On top of that fact, sealed sender has been known to be broken for some time now: https://www.ndss-symposium.org/ndss-paper/improving-signals-...

Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#226

Post by bkus »

Please bring back SMS support. It's hard enough to convince people to use Signal in the first place. Nobody is going to juggle multiple apps, they'll just go back to SMS default app.

Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#227

Post by jcul »

rafram wrote: post #214
fortylove wrote: post #201

It's been interesting to watch the Signal arc. From tech darling to "why do they think I want this" / "time to move on to what's next".

You would switch to a new, incompatible messaging app because the one you use adds a single feature that you don’t personally want to use?

Perhaps more due to frustration at prioritization of features that subjectively seem less important than some other desired feature?

For example, I would like to be able to log into signal from multiple devices, which currently isn't possible.

So, I could imagine switching to something like telegram (even though less secure) or matrix (even though a little trickier for non tech users), both of which allow me to do this.

Personally though, I'm still using signal, donating, and have converted a few people, I'm just speculating here.

Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#228

Post by worez »

bkus wrote: post #226

Please bring back SMS support. It's hard enough to convince people to use Signal in the first place. Nobody is going to juggle multiple apps, they'll just go back to SMS default app.

so many people I've gotten to switch to signal have asked me about them discontinuing SMS support. my family members aren't going to keep using signal just to message a few others, when the majority still use text.

still unsure how this decision made it through.

Re: Signal Introduces Stories

#230

Post by Barrin92 »

grapescheesee wrote: post #193
agundy wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They recently announced they are removing Sms support on Android which feels vastly more useful for the non-tech crowd.

I really hope they change course, and keep SMS. That is the single best feature of the android App. They will lose a lot of people if they don't.

I imagine it's a lot of hassle to maintain and outside of the US SMS is basically as dead as landline phones. They probably consulted their usage statistics when they made that decision.
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