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As an EU citizen I think that's a great decision.
I don't think so. Signal might be open source but the servers are still run in the USA and thus are subject to the US "legal system" (which in turn is subject to the mood of its president).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
France developed their own matrix protocol based network called tchap. Great idea for a nation that wants to stay independent in an increasingly american/chinese tech dependent world.
When the government in Germany does IT projects, they usually burn millions of Euros even for simple projects. And then, years after the planned rollout, the project is still unfinished and no politician wants to touch it anymore. My favorites was the "special email inbox for lawyers". So, I am somewhat hesitant to let the EU develop a chat client.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
So why couldn't the EU fund the development of a Signal fork that doesn't need phone numbers?
In theory, they could. But IMHO it would not be wise to overestimate the EU’s competence when it comes to purchasing software projects and writing a sane requirement specification. As a citizen within EU I would rather see them donate money to the Signal Technology Foundation instead. OTOH that could be controversial, so perhaps it would be better if citizens and companies would donate directly instead.
[0] Signal conducts the hiring and interviews, EU pays the salary
This is a mistake. They should at least compile their own version and not something that comes from an US based app store under US law. At any point the US can force a change. This is as secure as purchasing a machine from Crypto AG. [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypto_AG
Unfortunately, the IT department of the European Parliament has forbidden Signal Desktop and recommends WhatsApp.
I know Signal is secure and all — and I use it myself — but I can’t help but think how can we trusted that the central servers aren’t wiretapped? It would be the ultimate proof of security if one could transparently verify that the middle man is running the actual code it claims to be running.
As for the actual client, see https://signal.org/blog/reproducible-android/
Right now signal is not fully reproducible so you can't trust that the binary that they distribute does not use a different code.
The EU budget is 148 Billion Euros. Surely, if they have a requirement for a secure communication app, they have the wherewithal to build one for their needs, that EU citizens and others could then use if they so chose? Essential knowledge is definitely public. This is not about 'Signal' it's about why governments can't/won't deliver on so many issues they themselves deem to be very materially important to them, part…
That's a tad unfortunate. Signal was just low profile enough that my wife and I could use it in China. This raises the profile of it just a bit higher than I'd like. Further, with the likes of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22202110 having a higher profile makes the organisation more vulnerable to harassment from the government.
I would be more worried if only communist / socialist nations (you all know the ones I am talking about, not sure of a better name so calling them what they claim to be) were using it. If the NSA advises against Signal that might be another concern. It might mean a foreign intelligence has access somehow.
But what should I use if I am a politician and fundamentally believe that the government should be able to read my communications?
Wordpress. Nothing stops you from explicitly publishing your communications. And whether you do it explicitly, or implicitly by using an insecure communication method, it's always a choice which you can revoke at any time.
It looks like the replies to this comment misunderstand the point.
It's not about one person choosing to make their communication public, but that there should be a record of government communication period. Have we not seen enough examples of our elected officials corruption in media that isn't encrypted? Now we want them to be able to communicate in all manner with no accountability?