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I don't trust Signal

drewdevault.com

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Re: I don't trust Signal

#151

Post by innerspirit »

skywhopper wrote: post #102

This is a really poor post. Lots of in-the-weeds long-running-feud grudge holding snark, but no real examination of the issues at hand. And his assertions don't make sense in any case. You can't trust the Google Play store because a malicious actor might have swapped out the trusted roots on you. But then why should we trust F-Droid's signing infrastructure? Then he gripes that the posted APK has to be manually check…

The post is literally responding line by line to a post from 5 years ago. Very poorly thought out article.

Re: I don't trust Signal

#152

Post by alexnewman »

j16sdiz wrote: post #127
mathnmusic wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Signal, in an indirect way, requires 1/6th of the world's population to part with their biometrics. It requires phone number, and in India, getting a phone # requires Aadhaar, which is a centralized, biometrics-based ID (photo, fingerprints AND iris at the moment).

I see this as a good thing because it effectively rate limit the spam bot creations

Ya really think phone numbers are hard to get?

Re: I don't trust Signal

#153

Post by pdkl95 »

Vinnl wrote: post #100
pmlnr wrote: post #42

The article actually proposes an alternative: Matrix, and Matrix is, in fact, a good piece of software, with federation options. I tend to agree with most parts of the article, especially the lack of federation options. My real pain point with Signal is that there is no real desktop application for it - no, a connected web interface is not a desktop application. For example, XMPP with OMEMO can be used simultaneously…

What do you mean by a "connected" web interface? And what would being a desktop application bring it? Signal Desktop is somewhat buggy, not that full-features, and doesn't integrate that well with the rest of my OS, but otherwise it's working fine, and I can use it simultaneously with my phone. (But I can also use it with my phone turned off, which I love.)

> but otherwise it's working fine

It doesn't work at all for me, because it requires a mobile phone number, which I don't have (a phone + any monthly subscription fee doesn't fit in a tiny fixed income budget).

Re: I don't trust Signal

#154

Post by jhasse »

Vinnl wrote: post #144
jhasse wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because for some that's not a show-stopper.

In the context of this article, framed as an alternative to Signal, I think it should be.

Why?

Let's compare it to F-Droid: He isn't saying that Signal should be distributed via F-Droid by default, just that there should be the option. So the article doesn't seem to say that the defaults are what matter.

Re: I don't trust Signal

#155

Post by jhasse »

auslander wrote: post #146
jhasse wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has root access to every device just like Google has to Android phones running Google Play Services.

Security wise, Apple iOS is superior in any possible aspect to Android. Forensics people never complain how hard it is do Android, never :)

> Security wise, Apple iOS is superior in any possible aspect to Android.

One aspect where Android is superior is that more of it is open-source.

Re: I don't trust Signal

#156

Post by m-p-3 »

g_sch wrote: post #39

Some version of this post seems to circulate every few months or so. This one is more direct in its accusations of Moxie acting in bad faith. I think this is disingenuous. Moxie has been very clear[0] about the tradeoffs that Signal has made and the reasons for them. It's fine to be dissatisfied with those choices. It's another thing entirely to accuse Moxie of dissimulating. Personally, I'd like to see Signal replac…

I am not willing to support Signal if they are unwilling to federate the system.

Sure, it doesn't allow them the flexibility they'd like to have to move forward but in a way it won't be their fault if federated servers aren't keeping themselves up to date when there's a major protocol change and they get temporarily splitted from the pool.

Re: I don't trust Signal

#157

Post by samstave »

leetbulb wrote: post #134
guiraldelli wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am happy to see I am not the only person in the world that feels like this about Signal. The interesting fact is that I "Ctrl+F" this page for Wire and I have seen nothing, even though this comment is about something that made me switch over Wire from Signal: to date, that's the unique instant messaging that has FOSS'ed both the server and the clients. (OK, the article also says about Matrix.) I admire Wire for a n…

I love wire. Never have any issues with the desktop client nor mobile app. Even though it's Electron, it seems to be extremely focused on security. Unfortunately, it suffers from the same metadata issues as Signal. If you really need higher security messaging, p2p is your best bet, but then you may face correlation attacks by ISPs and whatnot... Maybe we all just need to get our HAM radio licenses :)

How is HAM secure? (I don't know anything about HAM)

Re: I don't trust Signal

#158

Post by move-on-by »

hutzlibu wrote: post #123
g_sch wrote: post #39

Some version of this post seems to circulate every few months or so. This one is more direct in its accusations of Moxie acting in bad faith. I think this is disingenuous. Moxie has been very clear[0] about the tradeoffs that Signal has made and the reasons for them. It's fine to be dissatisfied with those choices. It's another thing entirely to accuse Moxie of dissimulating. Personally, I'd like to see Signal replac…

But in the linked post he does not explain, why he does not maintain a F-Droid repository for people who do not trust google, nor why the original Signal Client does not connect to Signal Forks, even if they use everything the same. Security reasons? Ordinary smartphones are full of rootkits anyways, so someone using a forked Signal version probably is better of anyway, as he knows a bit more what he is doing. So the…

> Moxie forbids you from distributing branded builds of the Signal app ...

Having multiple branded builds to choose from would be a terrible thing and would easily allow fake apps to gain traction.

> ... and if you rebrand he forbids you from using the official Open Whisper servers.

This seems pretty fair to me. Not only could you abuse their resources, it would greatly hinder their ability to make changes and respond to protocol-level security threats. They aren't in the API business, controlling their ecosystem allows them to make forward progress without concern for 3rd parties that they have no control over. And still there is the issue of 3rd parties abusing their server resources.

Re: I don't trust Signal

#159

Post by tialaramex »

degenerate wrote: post #141
lowry wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would agree with you if only Signal would not ask for so many permissions on my phone.

It would be great if it asked for those permissions when it needed to do something - for example ask for mic permission at the point you want to make your first voice call. I see some apps going that direction and it's refreshing. edit: Apparently, Signal does this for some things? See comment-replies.

On Android that's version dependant.

Older Android versions only had the idea of the app declaring "I need to be able to use your Camera, read your Contacts, and make $$$ phone calls" and then you pick "No" and don't get the app or you pick "OK". This more or less railroads users into pressing "OK", except for the most security conscious, who go without the app.

A few releases back Google had an unofficial feature that let you switch off features an app had, and it would get some dummy replacement, e.g. if it had Contacts access but you switched that off, it would see no Contacts at all. If it had Camera access, but that was switched off, it would always be told your Camera was busy in another app. Once word about this hidden feature got out, Google disabled it.

Recent releases (Certainly on my Nexus 5X for example which is a while back) enable an app to ask at runtime. If you said "No" the app gets a second chance to explain itself, and then if you keep saying "No" the feature is just disabled and Android stops prompting you. The app might not work after that of course. Like the disabled older feature, the Settings pages for apps let you undo previous authorizations, again this may make certain apps malfunction - a map app with no GPS is merely crippled, but a "barcode scanner" with no Camera access is junk.

However of course apps for an older phone don't prompt, the older Android can't handle it, so for them you still have to make the decision at install time.

Re: I don't trust Signal

#160

Post by Gaelan »

Vinnl wrote: post #91
guiraldelli wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am happy to see I am not the only person in the world that feels like this about Signal. The interesting fact is that I "Ctrl+F" this page for Wire and I have seen nothing, even though this comment is about something that made me switch over Wire from Signal: to date, that's the unique instant messaging that has FOSS'ed both the server and the clients. (OK, the article also says about Matrix.) I admire Wire for a n…

> that's the unique instant messaging that has FOSS'ed both the server and the clients. Signal's server code is open source as well: https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Server And apparently the client can verify that the server is running that code: https://signal.org/blog/private-contact-discovery/#trust-but...

Note: my understanding of SGX is that this still requires trust of Intel. Still, far better than nothing
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