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FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

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Re: FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

#191

Post by ikmckenz »

bigyabai wrote: post #162
alsetmusic wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's one of those problems where as soon as someone notices, it's crazy that no one noticed. I can't imagine this not being overhauled going forward. It's just a bad way to operate and now it's news.

> I can't imagine this not being overhauled going forward. On which end, Apple or Signal? Because neither Apple nor Google will overhaul this behavior, the FBI asked for it directly: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/12/apple-admits-to-...

This is different than push data, which already does not contain any content or metadata in Signal. This is about local OS caches, whereas for push notifications Signal only sends a push saying “message received” which wakes the device up and triggers the device to pull the message from the server over the regular e2e encrypted path.

Re: FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

#192

Post by echelon_musk »

boysenberry wrote: post #77
echelon_musk wrote: post #68

As an aside, I decrypted an encrypted iPhone backup using a tool from GitHub because I wanted easy access to my Voice Memo recordings. Photos I had long deleted were still in the backup! It's quite surprising just how much is being stored by the phone.

What did you use?

https://github.com/PeterUpfold/dump-iphone-backup

Re: FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

#193

Post by avidiax »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #45
nickburns wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to clarify, this is within the Signal app settings—not the OS (iOS or Android) system settings. Critical distinction, as merely changing OS notification settings will simply prevent notification content from being displayed on-screen.

Signal should switch the default to being less verbose.

They should also signal your counterparty's security posture.

Basically, give you a heads up that the other side has settings that make the system less secure.

Re: FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

#194

Post by pipe01 »

chinathrow wrote: post #18

On Android, when I use WhatsApp and have notifications for groups turned off, I can still see that they arrive briefly and then get removed (the icon top left vanishes). I wonder often, if this is a way to push all group message content into an unencrypted data trace as well - for the same use case.

I've never seen this happen, maybe you're seeing the "Fetching messages" notification that sometimes pops up for a second?

Re: FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

#196

Post by gumby271 »

niek_pas wrote: post #33

I wonder why Apple doesn't 'just' delete the notification data associated with the app from the internal database when the user deletes the app? It seems like asking for problems to just keep old notification content around forever.

I think that's how the Android notification history works. If I uninstall an app, the entries in the history aren't shown anymore. You also have to opt in to notification history and toggling it off and back on clears the old entries. There's also a time window that it keeps entries for: https://source.android.com/docs/core/display/notification-hi...

Re: FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

#198

Post by SwtCyber »

jonpalmisc wrote: post #14

Settings > Notifications > Notification Content > Show: "Name Only" or "No Name or Content" I've had this enabled to prevent sensitive messages from appearing in full whilst showing someone something on my phone, but I guess this is an added benefit as well.

Originally enabled it just to avoid awkward moments

Re: FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

#199

Post by gumby271 »

nixosbestos wrote: post #70

Um. Android has notification history also and I see no similar ability to hide notification content from the system ...

In the Signal app itself there's an option to hide the message body or both the sender and body, that way the OS wont have anything to store in the history.

Re: FBI used iPhone notification data to retrieve deleted Signal messages

#200

Post by TeMPOraL »

nixosbestos wrote: post #151
TeMPOraL wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good. The moment they add it, all kinds of apps will start to abuse it, for "sekhurity" (read: engagement) reasons. See e.g. all the apps that now disallow taking screenshots, for no legitimate reason. Personally I'd be in favor of a hard app store policy, that if an app notifies you about something, all the importantdetails (like full message text) must be included - specifically to allow the user to view the import…

I'm referring to what sounds like a feature of the app , not the OS... The app... already chooses what to send through the OS notification API so I really don't have any idea what scenario you're worried about. I generally sympathize, I also don't like when apps block screenshots (or even more stupidly, they can block Android's amazing "select text from anywhere" feature...). But I don't think there are similar conce…

Right. I'm saying most apps shouldn't be allowed to send a notification at all if they're not going to put the proper content in it. As it is, many apps already choose to omit notification body, instead supplying nothing or some noninformative text, forcing you to tap through to the app to see what the notification was about. If Signal is doing anything unusual here, is that it has a switch to enable showing actual content.
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