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BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

element.io

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Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#211

Post by mxuribe »

Klonoar wrote: post #195
mxuribe wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

@Hamuko I have been on matrix several years, and lately I've been really liking Schildi Chat [ https://schildi.chat ]. Also, many other users that i know really like Fluffy Chat [ https://fluffychat.im/ ]. In any case, there are several more options nowadays.

There are really no options outside of Element, unless you're a Linux user - then maybe you have a few ones. All alternative clients on iOS, macOS, and arguably Windows are an absolute clusterfuck of UI/UX, broken features, and varying stages of completion. I say this as someone who wants Matrix to work: people need to demand more from client apps, and client apps need to stop being okay with barely hitting the bar.…

Interesting. I actually have never tried any clients on macOs or iOS. I don't have apple products. On Windows i only use web Element. I don't disagree that it's early days for all clients, and they all could use improvement. But, Element does offer an Electron app, which would run equally on all platforms (if i recall correctly). Now, i myself am not a fan of electron apps. But that would at least provide a consistent experience across different platforms. Regardless, i find myself quite hopeful on all this. There's no shortage of clients who i hope all improve over time. The more that matrix gets popular, the more it attracts devs and UX designers whose ideas will float all other "boats". ...At least i hope! :-)

Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#212

Post by fuoqi »

twblalock wrote: post #134
Fargren wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both of the examples I used had mandatory state IDs during their dictatorships. The IDs were not significantly instrumental to the government's power. I don't think the addition of RFID really would change that in the event of a new dictatorship. But even if mandatory RFID IDs were a critical tool of authoritarian governments, what would prevent the dictator from issuing mandatory IDs after taking power?

First of all, during the Franco government the internet was an academic curiosity and nobody carried smartphones. That has all changed, and the tools the government has to monitor people are way beefier than they were back then. Facial recognition cameras, for example. What prevents a dictator from issuing mandatory IDs? The resistance of the people. Yes, the government has police, and an army, and fighter jets, etc.…

>Ukraine is outfighting Russia despite massive disadvantages numerically and technologically

You are somewhat misinformed about the Ukrainian war. Ukraine has 3-4 times less population than Russia, but it started full mobilization early in the war. Meanwhile Russia started partial mobilization just recently. So it was common for the Ukranian army to have a numerical advantage on the ground. Most of the recent Russian retreats can be attributed to the lack of personnel to properly mount defensive positions.

As for technological advantage... It depends. Ukraine effectively has the whole NATO and a number of additional countries as its rear and supply base, while Russia depends only on itself and a bit on Iran. In terms of communication systems, intelligence, and likely anti-tank and anti-ship systems, the Ukrainian army is miles ahead of Russia. Russia has advantage in air, artillery, anti-air, and ground-to-ground rocket systems.

Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#213

Post by coretx »

The classic obligation of the state to testify who someone is -empowering citizens- ( by whatever means, including passports ) seems to be silently converted into the obligation of the citizen to proof who they are, taking power from them without their consent and potentially causing future abuse on a scale larger than the 1933 Reichstag fire.

Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#214

Post by fuoqi »

cies wrote: post #110

I'm happy to see this. I came out embarrassingly that Germany was spied on by the "ally" US. They already did not trust MS Exchange, probably for good reasons. So they either trust the Swiss (Signal), the Russians (Telegram, prolly not), the ..., or they roll their own, or they use open source. I'm stoked to see they seem (yes: seem) to be doing the latter. Why do I emphasize "seem". Well there have been several Germ…

>the Russians (Telegram, prolly not)

I wouldn't call it a "Russian" system. Just consider where Durov currently resides and has his wealth.

Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#215

Post by joeschmopoe »

bee_rider wrote: post #208
sandos wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its fascinating what EU can accomplish, but in my mind drivers licenses and "national IDs" (that are usable when travelling in EU) should be merged and unified over the union. Imagine how much simpler things would be! And this tech used in Germany sounds like a very nice base for it. I mean I would also make them passports but I think that is impossible.

I would imagine that different countries might had slightly different traffic laws or acceptable risk levels, so might want to have their own licensing schemes. Maybe the could have a unified form-factor that gets stamped by the individual countries though.

They do, all IDs are in ID-1 form factor, stamped by the countries and the EU [1].

It's the same for driver's licenses [2], they are accepted in all EU member states and basically look exactly the same, just in different languages and show a different flag.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_identity_cards_in_t...

[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_driving_licence

Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#216

Post by coretx »

cies wrote: post #110

I'm happy to see this. I came out embarrassingly that Germany was spied on by the "ally" US. They already did not trust MS Exchange, probably for good reasons. So they either trust the Swiss (Signal), the Russians (Telegram, prolly not), the ..., or they roll their own, or they use open source. I'm stoked to see they seem (yes: seem) to be doing the latter. Why do I emphasize "seem". Well there have been several Germ…

I don't know why the person who was first to respond to you is "dead" but set aside his value judgement; all he wrote is factually correct. The embarrassment you speak of lies in the fact that it became public knowledge, not in the act itself, depending on the perspective of specific institutions. Furthermore, disregarding the fact that signal is in Israeli hands, i'm fairly certain they don't even trust themselves and simply calculate and spread risks as they see fit. Regarding your Munich example, the most significant factors for the outcome of that debacle where at one end incompetent people backed by powerless competent people and on the other end Microsoft with millions of lobby money backed by a powerful state actor. Both can easily be regarded as both a risk and opportunity for state security. Your closing statement is of course indisputable, never the less we should not forget that despite the fact that times change; old adagia such as "Something you have, something you are, something you know" are not only easily understood by everyone but we are also getting there with for example the advent of cheap FIDO2 keys, fairly invisible network access control & encryption at device enrollment, infrared cameras, privacy respecting / agnostic AI driven real-time analytics & heuristics at scale and so on. In other words, we are slowly getting there but not due things such as "having a BundesMessenger" unless it's weaknesses contribute to the drive for improvement ~ including replacing American cloud services ~ ; something it's open source nature definitely does.

Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#217

Post by eredengrin »

jszymborski wrote: post #95
k__ wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

getting borked?

The most recent instance I experienced was the GrapheneOS rooms which suddenly just stopped working. https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/109510405342409074

To be clear, GrapheneOS was running on much older matrix room versions and the bugs that were causing the issues have (to my understanding) largely been mitigated in the later room versions. Of course it's not ideal it happened, but I wouldn't expect the same set of issues to persist after the upgrade, the mitigation has already existed it's just GrapheneOS (understandably) wanted to avoid the disruption of an upgrade if possible.

Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#218

Post by Zagill »

Lanz wrote: post #108
foepys wrote: post #38

Germany was quite advanced when it came to technology but then the drive to make more of it somehow stopped. It has always been incredibly sad to me that the German ID card (Personalausweis) has an RFID chip inside with trust zones, certificates, authorization features, and much more and just never had been used. Like at all except for getting cigarettes at vending machines. 12 years after the first RFID Personalausw…

It's almost as if the spirit of the people was broken as Germany drifted more and more leftward.

Yeah, they should try going to the right again. The people were very spirited last time

Re: BundesMessenger, a secure messenger for Germany’s public administration

#219

Post by coretx »

fuoqi wrote: post #214
cies wrote: post #110

I'm happy to see this. I came out embarrassingly that Germany was spied on by the "ally" US. They already did not trust MS Exchange, probably for good reasons. So they either trust the Swiss (Signal), the Russians (Telegram, prolly not), the ..., or they roll their own, or they use open source. I'm stoked to see they seem (yes: seem) to be doing the latter. Why do I emphasize "seem". Well there have been several Germ…

>the Russians (Telegram, prolly not) I wouldn't call it a "Russian" system. Just consider where Durov currently resides and has his wealth.

The power of any State regarding such things usually works by exercising control & influence over entire networks of people. Not so much by brute (legal) force applied at who or whatever holds the formal power. Quite often, such firms / owners / networks of people don't even fully realize what is going on if at all. Often it's even more than one State trying to achieve the same without it being "visible". TL;DR We don't know shit by just observing media reports & firm/executive behavior. But if you did a actual "Follow the Money" on Durov, i'd love to see it ! ( Although I do like what he seems to be doing. )
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