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Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

element.io

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Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#181

Post by superkuh »

This basically means that Matrix will stop working for my parents and other family: the only people I use matrix for. We started during the pandemic for the video chat element. But Riot.im/Element.io changes to the homeserver over these many years have made it so none of our accounts properly verify. I can't even get my account to properly verify and I'm a huge nerd. We put up with it because of inertia and chat still working fine. But this? I guess it's the end.

Riot.im/Element.io really knows how to shoot themselves in the foot.

Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#182

Post by leetnewb »

mxuribe wrote: post #45
toastal wrote: post #20

I tried out an alpha client once & can’t get the stupid pop-up about unverified devices to go away now. Another client didn’t have the verification flow even set up—this will end up being yet another barrier to entry for new clients. With the clients (yes, multiple) crashing often, constantly syncing for ages, & feature sets not on parity + without graceful fallbacks, I do not like the Matrix client space (nor the se…

I used to consider myself a HUUUGE matrix fanboy....while i still respect what the teams have done over time, I have been feeling a little, i don't know, deflated maybe? Maybe its the UX/UI aspect, i don;t know...i have not run a homeserver since like maybe 2019 or so? But nowadays, i have less interest in running a homeserver, and as far using the various clients: meh. Element feels bloated, and others either might…

One thing I would note on the client side of xmpp - there does seem to be a lot of work happening under the surface. Snikket is working on an SDK to streamline modern client development. There are a couple of alpha stage clients written on it already, and maturatoin of the SDK should lower the bar for pushing clients forward.

Also independently, Movim keeps advancing and Libervia is doing a ton of cool work. I'm sure I am missing others.

Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#183

Post by [deleted] »

Aurornis wrote: post #173
teekert wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not forget a team making a great free product. Yeah we can complain about filthy materials but imagine you working hard to build something as nice as Matrix/Element only for these low-lifes to do these horrible things to it. How annoying it must be to have to spend time battling such things.

> Let's not forget a team making a great free product. I am fully appreciative of the work that goes into making a product like this, but I’m also tired of this mentality that nobody is allowed to talk about the problems with the product. Even simple comments from people who tried to use the product but encountered show-stopping issues are getting downvoted into gray text in this thread. This mentality that we must o…

[deleted]

Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#184

Post by the_gipsy »

iqihs wrote: post #23

I think Matrix as a protocol has been pretty ineffective, as their top priority seems to be keeping data permanent and duplicated. Both performance and privacy are at the bottom of their priority list. The one good thing I can say about it is that encryption of message contents is enabled by default in conversations and available in groups, but that's about it - nothing else is, or can be, encrypted. In other words,…

To be fair: signal means everybody trusts one central authority. Doesn't matter that it's a foundation or non-profit or whatever.

And: a phone number is still required, a PIN is not, so by default it's susceptible to phone/SIM spoofing attacks. This one really boggles my mind, it's not that I personally am afraid of this vector, but I don't understand why they would insist on phone numbers at this point.

Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#185

Post by AJ007 »

this_user wrote: post #50
iqihs wrote: post #23

I think Matrix as a protocol has been pretty ineffective, as their top priority seems to be keeping data permanent and duplicated. Both performance and privacy are at the bottom of their priority list. The one good thing I can say about it is that encryption of message contents is enabled by default in conversations and available in groups, but that's about it - nothing else is, or can be, encrypted. In other words,…

I think part of the problem may be that Matrix is just pretty complex, because of its modular and decentralised design. Meanwhile, Signal is much more centralised and monolithic. And while they have added a few features over the years, its core functionality is relatively simple, and they were initially just focussed on getting that right.

The "decentralization" of Matrix is true in some respects, and false in others. Which would be ok, but if all of the complex architecture and issues are in the support of being decentralized, then this seems like an early planning failure.

My suspicion is the real problem that exists now originated from the bifurcation of desktop and mobile. Mobile broke the true p2p decentralization which was easy on desktop, and the split between Android and iOS makes it worse. Users expect an experience on iOS and Android which has parity with desktop. And the entire thing has to be as good as Discord.

I've taken a hard look at all of the truly open source alternative messaging options, and almost nothing handles multi-platform very well. Even when you expand it to commercial options, for a very long time, all of the Slack clones had mediocre mobile apps -- which basically was a death sentence if you weren't Microsoft. This is true today, but I expect it will change in 2026 and onward with the rapid increase in software development driven by AI agents.

Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#186

Post by lukan »

johnisgood wrote: post #169
Teever wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait a minute, doesn't receiving child porn even if unintentionally like the situation above open up the receiver to legal liability? It isn't reasonable to expect users to be 'mentally prepared' to have their devices download child porn because they visited a chat room for support about the chat app they're using.

As someone else have said, then that is an issue with the law. Imagine someone sending you a link that you open and then now you have child porn or whatever else on your hard drive, cached. Quite a shitty situation to be in. Perhaps avoid non-technical rooms or rooms in which you do not trust people.

"Imagine someone sending you a link that you open and then now you have child porn or whatever else on your hard drive, cached. Quite a shitty situation to be in."

I guess the correct legal approach would be to go to police with this.

And the correct technical approach to keep online spaces clean, is the ability to kick, mute or ban people who violate the rules.

Saying, "just be mentally prepared" sounds to me like accepting it. Well, I don't. I go somewhere else.

Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#188

Post by johnisgood »

lukan wrote: post #186
johnisgood wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone else have said, then that is an issue with the law. Imagine someone sending you a link that you open and then now you have child porn or whatever else on your hard drive, cached. Quite a shitty situation to be in. Perhaps avoid non-technical rooms or rooms in which you do not trust people.

"Imagine someone sending you a link that you open and then now you have child porn or whatever else on your hard drive, cached. Quite a shitty situation to be in." I guess the correct legal approach would be to go to police with this. And the correct technical approach to keep online spaces clean, is the ability to kick, mute or ban people who violate the rules. Saying, "just be mentally prepared" sounds to me like a…

I did not use the term "mentally prepared" because I thought it was appropriate, I was just quoting the other guy. I find it silly, too. I will not "accept" child porn or other degeneracies.

> Saying, "just be mentally prepared" sounds to me like accepting it. Well, I don't. I go somewhere else.

Exactly! You should be going somewhere else. Another Matrix instance, or at the very least another room, and you will be fine.

Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#189

Post by gmerc »

teekert wrote: post #91
Sanzig wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not forget the shock image spam issue. Public Matrix channels are plagued with horrendous shock images (including CSAM). The development team seems to not care, they have a proposal for "policy servers" which is still incomplete and not supported by all server implementations.

Let's not forget a team making a great free product. Yeah we can complain about filthy materials but imagine you working hard to build something as nice as Matrix/Element only for these low-lifes to do these horrible things to it. How annoying it must be to have to spend time battling such things.

A product as unsuitable for the adversarial internet as ChatGPT and coding agents

Re: Verifying your Matrix devices is becoming mandatory

#190

Post by [deleted] »

Aurornis wrote: post #173
teekert wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not forget a team making a great free product. Yeah we can complain about filthy materials but imagine you working hard to build something as nice as Matrix/Element only for these low-lifes to do these horrible things to it. How annoying it must be to have to spend time battling such things.

> Let's not forget a team making a great free product. I am fully appreciative of the work that goes into making a product like this, but I’m also tired of this mentality that nobody is allowed to talk about the problems with the product. Even simple comments from people who tried to use the product but encountered show-stopping issues are getting downvoted into gray text in this thread. This mentality that we must o…

[deleted]
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