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Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

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Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#11

Post by zeveb »

tptacek wrote: post #8
zeveb wrote: post #5

It'd be better, of course, if we didn't rely on Signal not storing all that metadata and instead used a protocol which made it impossible for anyone to be in a position to choose whether or not to store it. Unfortunately, the protocols that enable truly traffic–analysis-resistant messaging (I believe the Pynchon Gate[1] is currently the best-of-breed) tend to have increased latency and consume greatly-increased bandw…

What metadata? All they were able to produce was whether or not a phone number was associated with Signal at all , and the last time that phone number's account pinged the Signal service for any reason . They produced virtually no metadata to the investigation.

Only because they don't store it. They are able to choose to store it at any point; we can only rely on their honesty (and lack of compulsion). It's better to have a protocol in which there isn't any significant metadata to choose to store.

I don't distrust them today, but I have no way of knowing what their future behaviour will be. I'd prefer not to have to trust.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#12

Post by CaptSpify »

yincrash wrote: post #4
woah wrote: post #3

FYI, Signal has access to all metadata about messages and calls (but not the content of course). They claim not to store it and I believe them for now but someone else could be storing it. They don't have access to group message membership directly. A group appears as a bunch of one to one messages between the participants, so they might still be able to infer it.

If they were storing that metadata, they would be lying in the response to their subpoena.

That doesn't prove they don't have it though. I'm skeptical of the suggestion as well, but people can lie.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#13

Post by kenOfYugen »

zeveb wrote: post #5

It'd be better, of course, if we didn't rely on Signal not storing all that metadata and instead used a protocol which made it impossible for anyone to be in a position to choose whether or not to store it. Unfortunately, the protocols that enable truly traffic–analysis-resistant messaging (I believe the Pynchon Gate[1] is currently the best-of-breed) tend to have increased latency and consume greatly-increased bandw…

What about Vuvuzela? Haven't thoroughly examined it, but it focuses on metadata-privary and -relative- scalability.

web: https://vuvuzela.io/

repo: https://github.com/davidlazar/vuvuzela

paper: https://davidlazar.org/papers/vuvuzela.pdf

slides: https://davidlazar.org/slides/vuvuzela-sosp2015.pdf

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#14

Post by zeveb »

CiPHPerCoder wrote: post #7
zeveb wrote: post #5

It'd be better, of course, if we didn't rely on Signal not storing all that metadata and instead used a protocol which made it impossible for anyone to be in a position to choose whether or not to store it. Unfortunately, the protocols that enable truly traffic–analysis-resistant messaging (I believe the Pynchon Gate[1] is currently the best-of-breed) tend to have increased latency and consume greatly-increased bandw…

Are you familiar with the Aqua project? I haven't seen it discussed much among privacy researchers, but it's certainly interesting. https://aqua.mpi-sws.org

Looks interesting … I'm looking forward to spending some time reading up on it.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#15

Post by StavrosK »

zeveb wrote: post #5

It'd be better, of course, if we didn't rely on Signal not storing all that metadata and instead used a protocol which made it impossible for anyone to be in a position to choose whether or not to store it. Unfortunately, the protocols that enable truly traffic–analysis-resistant messaging (I believe the Pynchon Gate[1] is currently the best-of-breed) tend to have increased latency and consume greatly-increased bandw…

Yeah, but I'm kind of tired of having to fight my own government every step of the way. I'd prefer a political solution at this point.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#16

Post by zaroth »

problems wrote: post #9
tptacek wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What metadata? All they were able to produce was whether or not a phone number was associated with Signal at all , and the last time that phone number's account pinged the Signal service for any reason . They produced virtually no metadata to the investigation.

They would also be able to figure out what phone numbers it was communicating with, at what times and how often - they do the routing. We're relying on them not to store that metadata, which is the problem.

We're relying on them not being successfully compelled to retain that metadata -- which is a significantly different proposition.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#17

Post by CiPHPerCoder »

zeveb wrote: post #11
tptacek wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What metadata? All they were able to produce was whether or not a phone number was associated with Signal at all , and the last time that phone number's account pinged the Signal service for any reason . They produced virtually no metadata to the investigation.

Only because they don't store it. They are able to choose to store it at any point; we can only rely on their honesty (and lack of compulsion). It's better to have a protocol in which there isn't any significant metadata to choose to store. I don't distrust them today, but I have no way of knowing what their future behaviour will be. I'd prefer not to have to trust.

Is this something OWS could be subpoena'd for? Or something that the government would just subpoena Google for?

(I mean, given a phone number, can't you identify someone's Google Play account anyway? That sounds more useful.)

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#18

Post by segmondy »

tptacek wrote: post #8
zeveb wrote: post #5

It'd be better, of course, if we didn't rely on Signal not storing all that metadata and instead used a protocol which made it impossible for anyone to be in a position to choose whether or not to store it. Unfortunately, the protocols that enable truly traffic–analysis-resistant messaging (I believe the Pynchon Gate[1] is currently the best-of-breed) tend to have increased latency and consume greatly-increased bandw…

What metadata? All they were able to produce was whether or not a phone number was associated with Signal at all , and the last time that phone number's account pinged the Signal service for any reason . They produced virtually no metadata to the investigation.

Exactly, did he read the article?

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#19

Post by problems »

zaroth wrote: post #16
problems wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would also be able to figure out what phone numbers it was communicating with, at what times and how often - they do the routing. We're relying on them not to store that metadata, which is the problem.

We're relying on them not being successfully compelled to retain that metadata -- which is a significantly different proposition.

No, not really - they can decide at any time to start storing that metadata of their own will, use it internally, sell it to advertisers or turn it over via a direct law enforcement portal if they want. Their access alone is in many ways a problem.

Re: Grand jury subpoena for Signal user data

#20

Post by 5ersi »

CaptSpify wrote: post #12
yincrash wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they were storing that metadata, they would be lying in the response to their subpoena.

That doesn't prove they don't have it though. I'm skeptical of the suggestion as well, but people can lie.

Since their client apps are OSS you can check yourself: https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Android
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