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Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

micahflee.com

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Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#61

Post by duskwuff »

wmf wrote: post #58
mdhb wrote: post #3

The big part of this story which nobody is talking about is the fact that the app is literally controlled by a bunch of “former” Israeli intelligence officers. Who now have what is arguably the worlds most valuable access out of anyone.

The US and many other countries have been buying Israeli surveillance tools for years or decades. I would hope that any message archiving is being done on an organization-owned server though.

> I would hope that any message archiving is being done on an organization-owned server though.

There's compelling evidence that the messages all pass through TM servers before being archived.

https://www.404media.co/the-signal-clone-the-trump-admin-use...

Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#62

Post by be_erik »

This news story has been strange for me for awhile because on one hand NO our public officials should not be using Signal, but it isn’t because Signal is a bad technology choice. Signal is great. It’s probably the most useable service that’s verifiably secure.

Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#63

Post by be_erik »

Installing Signal using this method provides none of the guarantees Signal can normally provide by being an open verifiable application. It not only opens you up to state actors, but also IT folks like us. This is very much tech news. It helps explain why MDM is both critically important for businesses and terrible for security.

Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#64

Post by be_erik »

There’s chatter on bsky.

But tl;dr anything said on those phones is assumed to be compromised until proven otherwise by time or a whole lot of very interesting security verifications. So far the evidence that this is a very large leak looks probable based on the evidence presented.

Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#65

Post by tmpz22 »

ipv6ipv4 wrote: post #15
ComputerGuru wrote: post #10

White House communications director previously revealed (after “Signalgate”) that Signal was an approved and whitelisted app for gov’t officials to have on work phones and even discuss top-secret matters on. But I haven’t heard that TeleMessage was approved (and I’d have serious questions if it were given the foreign intelligence factor). Anyone know if there is a clear answer to whether it’s been approved?

It was incontrovertibly approved as it is only installable via MDM. A likely explanation is that the communications director (or the people informing her) wouldn’t know to distinguish between Signal the app, and a Signal compatible app that is nearly indistinguishable from Signal. A lot like Kleenex is a common term for tissue paper regardless of brand. When the leak was first revealed, there was loud speculation abo…

If DOGE can storm into government offices and get root access to sensitive system without proper procedure, couldn't SECDEF and co. strong arm their way past the IT worker managing the MDM?

Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#66

Post by doctorpangloss »

nine_k wrote: post #48
mingus88 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This TM SGNL app is compatible with legit Signal clients and servers. It’s also possible that they are using this app to archive chats that other parties _believe_ to be disappeared. In other words, set your chats to disappear in 5 minutes and convince your target to dish some sensitive info. They think it’s off the record, but it’s instantly archived

The counterparty should be naive or stupid to think that whatever they send has no chance to be recorded forever. They should always assume otherwise. The only interesting use case of disappearing messages is that messages one receives will disappear securely, even if they forget about receiving such messages, or have no access to the device at the time.

Naive or stupid? No way, not the counterparties of alcoholic media personalities.

Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#67

Post by be_erik »

watusername wrote: post #45
ComputerGuru wrote: post #10

White House communications director previously revealed (after “Signalgate”) that Signal was an approved and whitelisted app for gov’t officials to have on work phones and even discuss top-secret matters on. But I haven’t heard that TeleMessage was approved (and I’d have serious questions if it were given the foreign intelligence factor). Anyone know if there is a clear answer to whether it’s been approved?

According to the new 404 Media article [0] about the app's archive server actually being hacked, TeleMessage does have contracts with several governmental agencies. Still not a direct answer to the question, I know, but it tilts the answer overwhelmingly towards "yes." [0]: https://www.404media.co/the-signal-clone-the-trump-admin-use...

This is so frightening. I worked in corporate security, and that was occasionally a leaking ship, but this wouldn’t even fly with our engineers even if we wanted their message history. This is negligence.

Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#68

Post by be_erik »

ryanwatkins wrote: post #31
ipv6ipv4 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was incontrovertibly approved as it is only installable via MDM. A likely explanation is that the communications director (or the people informing her) wouldn’t know to distinguish between Signal the app, and a Signal compatible app that is nearly indistinguishable from Signal. A lot like Kleenex is a common term for tissue paper regardless of brand. When the leak was first revealed, there was loud speculation abo…

> It was incontrovertibly approved as it is only installable via MDM. Only if this his standard govt issued phone. It's also been shown they are also using their own personal phones. The could easily be using unapproved phones some random DOGE'er bought gave them with an MDM setup, without any real oversight.

This is currently my bet. This looks like something I would set up— state actors are not in my threat list. But, I’m usually being paid to protect the employer not the employee.

Re: Technical analysis of the Signal clone used by Trump officials

#70

Post by be_erik »

Mbwagava wrote: post #26
spenvo wrote: post #20

There is new reporting that a hacker has breached the parent company, TeleMessage, including live data being passed across servers in production. https://www.404media.co/the-signal-clone-the-trump-admin-use... It was marked as a DUPE of this discussion, despite being a major new development https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43890034 Hopefully that decision can be reconsidered

How does this happen when signal itself is open source?

They used an internal fork delivered via MDM. There are no guarantees that Signal can make about the software running on those phones and per the reports it’s a lot of phones.
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