Why Not Signal?
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Why Not Signal?
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Re: Why Not Signal?
#2>In April 2021, signal outraged the open-source community by going a whole year without publishing their server code updates.
So? We have no way to be sure what is actually running on the server. In an end to end encrypted system, if the server can degrade security then you are doing it wrong.
Re: Why Not Signal?
#3No post body was provided.
Re: Why Not Signal?
#4Messaging is so low bandwidth I'm surprised there's not an E2E p2p chat client that uses a DHT to find all the other clients.
Re: Why Not Signal?
#5People get very emotional about this. So, maybe instead of it being “signal” it was instead: “closed chat app”.
I have an issue with closed chat app. My issue is that it’s closed, but often pretends to be secure.
I can’t be sure it is secure, because they pay lip service to open source, they also integrate another Foreign (to me) companies binary SDK which is also not open source.
They’re also a closed system, meaning that they have direct network effects and have been hostile to third party implementations of clients.
The protocol is documented (somewhat homegrown, more like an evolution of something existing), and the server is “open”, but it’s not possible to actually use these things.
The politics of the founder are sometimes in question. They’re also foreign to me and have had brushes with their nations law enforcement. Whether I can trust them shouldn’t be my concern- if the service were open it would not be.
So, I personally don’t believe in it.
I would _rather_ have a small collection of TLS irc servers or zulip servers, because lots of small targets is better than a big centralised one; Better than that is matrix which is properly federated.
Tell me though, was I talking about signal, whatsapp or telegram?
They all suffer the same problems and people like to bicker about their personal favourite; forgetting that you shouldn’t be throwing in to this kind closed ecosystem with its stupid network effects.
Re: Why Not Signal?
#6Messaging is so low bandwidth I'm surprised there's not an E2E p2p chat client that uses a DHT to find all the other clients.
There is. It’s called “Tox”.
Re: Why Not Signal?
#7Fairly large discussion 7 months ago (45pts, 37 comments)[0] Commenters did not take too kindly to it at the time.
Re: Why Not Signal?
#8What could Signal do to prove they aren't a honeypot?
I have no idea if they are or not, but it'd be a disaster if they are. Or maybe not. I suppose people might just shrug it off like the NSA. sigh.
Re: Why Not Signal?
#9Why does it need a cryptocurrency built into the messenger exactly? [0]
The fact that this whole post about Signal is now flagged on HN tells you about why they cannot answer this simple question.
[0] https://github.com/dessalines/essays/blob/master/why_not_sig...
Re: Why Not Signal?
#10Throughout this page, the author fluidly shifts between conspiracy theories (that the CIA may be controlling Signal), opinions (that for a messaging platform to be good it must be self-hostable), and misdirection (NSLs exist, but it’s noteworthy that if you use a non-US company, the USG doesn’t need a warrant at all to compromise and extract data).
Moxie has been pretty clear about the problem Signal is trying to solve: radically upgrading the security of messaging for the masses. I’d say he’s clearly accomplished that: for the average human, migrating from SMS / email / etc to Signal or WhatsApp will immediately make their communications an order of magnitude more secure.