7 ms·

No private chats at all for Windows/Linux. It is actually insane that (unless I'm missing something) there is no usable/accessible trustworthy end2end encryptio

by lqdc13 10y ago

No private chats at all for Windows/Linux. It is actually insane that (unless I'm missing something) there is no usable/accessible trustworthy end2end encryption chat program that has both mobile and desktop clients. Note: Telegram desktop alternative apps have major usability issues at least on Linux. Edit: Also, many people refuse to install/use Chrome for various reasons, so even if you don't have to open ports, this still won't be a solution.

dmix 10y ago
> Edit: Also, many people refuse to install/use Chrome for various reasons, so even if you don't have to open ports, this still won't be a solution. Let's be honest, there aren't many. Chromium is enough to please the majority of OSS people. And if they are not using Chrome for 'security' reasons they are very misinformed.
- mike-cardwell 10y ago
  I don't use Chrome or Chromium because I'm not happy with advertising companies deciding how the web should develop. Companies who's very survival is based on being able to extract information about users, being empowered to pick and choose what goes into modern web browsers due to market share? Great idea, with no possible long term damage.
  - dmix 10y ago
    Better not watch any TV shows, read newspapers, or use any search engines either then. They are all financed by ads. /s Chromium is the best product on the market. I honestly don't see what negative influence Google's business model has on it. I use Duckduckgo as my default search engine and Google doesn't do any monitoring/tracking in Chrome, despite what most people think.
    - mike-cardwell 10y ago
      Nice straw man. Firefox is the best product on the market. Google makes money from tracking people on the web. They will not introduce or develop new technology to their web browser which hits that revenue stream hard. By using Chrome or Chromium you are giving them market share and therefore power to shape the future of the web. The future of the web under Googles custodian is more advertising, more tracking and less privacy. It's pretty obvious.
    - tripzilch 10y ago
      Hey everyone has their own preferences. I try out a different browser every once in a while, or you may lose out on a feature that the "other" side has, or maybe a degradation that is not. Way back when, the great eagle king of browsers used to be Opera, no competition :) But those days are long gone (and after they fired the Presto team, the only similarity today is the name of the company, don't even bother). Currently am using Firefox. Recently gave Chromium a good try for a month or so, for my personal experiences, right now best product on the market is Firefox. The address bar / search bar in Chromium is just inferior--you only get ~five autocompletes from your history and bookmarks, total. That basically means there's a reasonable chance the thing you're looking for will appear, but it's not really something you can rely on to navigate the personal knowledge base of bookmarks and history. Not talking about search suggestions btw. The other thing is Firefox Android supports Add-ons, so you can have uBlock and Ghostery on your phone (not even sure why anyone would even begin to consider a browser that doesn't support adblocking?) and Firefox Sync works well, to connect to the desktop and back (gave Pocket a try, didn't like it). I also use DDG as default search in Firefox, very useful with the bang syntaxes, more powerful than Google (which is just a !g away anyhow). Also in Chromium, so the address bar feels more familiar and somewhat makes up for its lack of power :)
- wtallis 10y ago
  Show me where to get a NoScript replacement and I'll consider that Chrome or Chromium might have a clear advantage in security. But if you try to point me at an extension that only blocks JavaScript based on URLs, I'll consider you very misinformed.
  - exo762 10y ago
    This is a misdirection. Nobody is arguing for switching to Chromium as primary browser. One can use it as app framework for Signal.
  - twr 10y ago
    NoScript does more than block JavaScript, but if that's all you're interested in, uBlock Origin can block inline and external scripts on a global or site-specific basis. https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering:-quick-guide https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering:-qu...
- lawnchair_larry 10y ago
  It's quite a battery killer as well. For a simple IM app, you lose hours of battery life.
Dolores12 10y ago
OTR plugin[1] has been around for years. I have used it on top of icq, aim, skype and jabber. Also there are few clients for android that support jabber & otr. [1] https://otr.cypherpunks.ca/ https://otr.cypherpunks.ca/
- lqdc13 10y ago
  Try to get an average user to copy their private keys onto android from their adium/pidgin install... Even just using adium with other people using adium with the plugin had all kinds of usability issues for me.
- mynewtb 10y ago
  OTR does not support offline messages which makes it utterly useless in the modern, mobile world. OMEMO is what it's at.
ahalam 10y ago
You will find https:///www.wire.com/ https:///www.wire.com/ interesting. e2e encrypted, clients for Windows, Mac, Android & iOS. And chats are synched between all your clients. Also .. no phone number required to sign up; use your email.
- lqdc13 10y ago
  Missing Linux native, but that might be too much to ask. Thanks for the link. I'll give it a try. Do you know if it's open source or at least gone through an audit?
  - ahalam 10y ago
    The crypto modules are indeed open source. https://github.com/wireapp https://github.com/wireapp I don't know whether they have been formally audited.
    - pritambaral 10y ago
      That would be the source of some crypto code, not necessarily the code the app itself uses. Since the app is closed, there's no way to verify.
- LeoPanthera 10y ago
  How is client sync possible with e2e?
  - lqdc13 10y ago
    Why wouldn't it be possible? The app knows who is sending to who and which devices are linked.
    - ianpurton 10y ago
      Because if it's end to end encrypted each device would either need the same private key to decode the messages or each message is encrypted with each devices public key. This would require some kind of key exchange i.e. scanning bar codes.
akerro 10y ago
qTox, µTox and Antox do the job. Antox is very batter hungry, but that was it comes with fully decentralized network (DHT nodes setup by volunteers) with complete end to end encryption. https://tox.chat/ https://tox.chat/
- bisby 10y ago
  does tox have device syncing yet? I usually set my phone down out of reach when at a computer, but still need to receive messages on the go. I have antox and qTox both installed, but Im not going to convince other people to switch if it's not going to be in a usable state.
ScarZy 10y ago
Am I missing something? Why would you want to use an alternative app for Telegram on Linux? Their own app works a dream for me.
- lqdc13 10y ago
  No encryption which defeats the purpose of using it.
tripzilch 10y ago
The UX of the official Linux desktop Telegram client is really nice, IMHO. Simple and snappy even on a low-powered netbook. Syncs perfectly and immediately across devices. Copy/paste/drag/drop of images and files works very well. I also like the option-on-hover "drop here to quickly send compressed photo / drop here to send without compression" for its ease of use. Although given I had to explain some people, less curious / techsavvy people may not discover it or notice it. But yeah, no encryption to speak of. So I'm no longer going to recommend Telegram over Whatsapp :) Just pointing out how much I like the UX of the Telegram client, no reason why you couldn't have that on a properly encrypted platform, after all :)

by lqdc13 10y ago

dmix 10y ago

> Edit: Also, many people refuse to install/use Chrome for various reasons, so even if you don't have to open ports, this still won't be a solution. Let's be honest, there aren't many. Chromium is enough to please the majority of OSS people. And if they are not using Chrome for 'security' reasons they are very misinformed.

mike-cardwell 10y ago
I don't use Chrome or Chromium because I'm not happy with advertising companies deciding how the web should develop. Companies who's very survival is based on being able to extract information about users, being empowered to pick and choose what goes into modern web browsers due to market share? Great idea, with no possible long term damage.
- dmix 10y ago
  Better not watch any TV shows, read newspapers, or use any search engines either then. They are all financed by ads. /s Chromium is the best product on the market. I honestly don't see what negative influence Google's business model has on it. I use Duckduckgo as my default search engine and Google doesn't do any monitoring/tracking in Chrome, despite what most people think.
  - mike-cardwell 10y ago
    Nice straw man. Firefox is the best product on the market. Google makes money from tracking people on the web. They will not introduce or develop new technology to their web browser which hits that revenue stream hard. By using Chrome or Chromium you are giving them market share and therefore power to shape the future of the web. The future of the web under Googles custodian is more advertising, more tracking and less privacy. It's pretty obvious.
  - tripzilch 10y ago
    Hey everyone has their own preferences. I try out a different browser every once in a while, or you may lose out on a feature that the "other" side has, or maybe a degradation that is not. Way back when, the great eagle king of browsers used to be Opera, no competition :) But those days are long gone (and after they fired the Presto team, the only similarity today is the name of the company, don't even bother). Currently am using Firefox. Recently gave Chromium a good try for a month or so, for my personal experiences, right now best product on the market is Firefox. The address bar / search bar in Chromium is just inferior--you only get ~five autocompletes from your history and bookmarks, total. That basically means there's a reasonable chance the thing you're looking for will appear, but it's not really something you can rely on to navigate the personal knowledge base of bookmarks and history. Not talking about search suggestions btw. The other thing is Firefox Android supports Add-ons, so you can have uBlock and Ghostery on your phone (not even sure why anyone would even begin to consider a browser that doesn't support adblocking?) and Firefox Sync works well, to connect to the desktop and back (gave Pocket a try, didn't like it). I also use DDG as default search in Firefox, very useful with the bang syntaxes, more powerful than Google (which is just a !g away anyhow). Also in Chromium, so the address bar feels more familiar and somewhat makes up for its lack of power :)
wtallis 10y ago
Show me where to get a NoScript replacement and I'll consider that Chrome or Chromium might have a clear advantage in security. But if you try to point me at an extension that only blocks JavaScript based on URLs, I'll consider you very misinformed.
- exo762 10y ago
  This is a misdirection. Nobody is arguing for switching to Chromium as primary browser. One can use it as app framework for Signal.
- twr 10y ago
  NoScript does more than block JavaScript, but if that's all you're interested in, uBlock Origin can block inline and external scripts on a global or site-specific basis. https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering:-quick-guide https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering:-qu...
lawnchair_larry 10y ago
It's quite a battery killer as well. For a simple IM app, you lose hours of battery life.

Dolores12 10y ago

OTR plugin[1] has been around for years. I have used it on top of icq, aim, skype and jabber. Also there are few clients for android that support jabber & otr. [1] https://otr.cypherpunks.ca/ https://otr.cypherpunks.ca/

lqdc13 10y ago
Try to get an average user to copy their private keys onto android from their adium/pidgin install... Even just using adium with other people using adium with the plugin had all kinds of usability issues for me.
mynewtb 10y ago
OTR does not support offline messages which makes it utterly useless in the modern, mobile world. OMEMO is what it's at.

ahalam 10y ago

You will find https:///www.wire.com/ https:///www.wire.com/ interesting. e2e encrypted, clients for Windows, Mac, Android & iOS. And chats are synched between all your clients. Also .. no phone number required to sign up; use your email.

lqdc13 10y ago
Missing Linux native, but that might be too much to ask. Thanks for the link. I'll give it a try. Do you know if it's open source or at least gone through an audit?
- ahalam 10y ago
  The crypto modules are indeed open source. https://github.com/wireapp https://github.com/wireapp I don't know whether they have been formally audited.
  - pritambaral 10y ago
    That would be the source of some crypto code, not necessarily the code the app itself uses. Since the app is closed, there's no way to verify.
LeoPanthera 10y ago
How is client sync possible with e2e?
- lqdc13 10y ago
  Why wouldn't it be possible? The app knows who is sending to who and which devices are linked.
  - ianpurton 10y ago
    Because if it's end to end encrypted each device would either need the same private key to decode the messages or each message is encrypted with each devices public key. This would require some kind of key exchange i.e. scanning bar codes.

akerro 10y ago

qTox, µTox and Antox do the job. Antox is very batter hungry, but that was it comes with fully decentralized network (DHT nodes setup by volunteers) with complete end to end encryption. https://tox.chat/ https://tox.chat/

bisby 10y ago
does tox have device syncing yet? I usually set my phone down out of reach when at a computer, but still need to receive messages on the go. I have antox and qTox both installed, but Im not going to convince other people to switch if it's not going to be in a usable state.

ScarZy 10y ago

Am I missing something? Why would you want to use an alternative app for Telegram on Linux? Their own app works a dream for me.

lqdc13 10y ago
No encryption which defeats the purpose of using it.

tripzilch 10y ago

The UX of the official Linux desktop Telegram client is really nice, IMHO. Simple and snappy even on a low-powered netbook. Syncs perfectly and immediately across devices. Copy/paste/drag/drop of images and files works very well. I also like the option-on-hover "drop here to quickly send compressed photo / drop here to send without compression" for its ease of use. Although given I had to explain some people, less curious / techsavvy people may not discover it or notice it. But yeah, no encryption to speak of. So I'm no longer going to recommend Telegram over Whatsapp :) Just pointing out how much I like the UX of the Telegram client, no reason why you couldn't have that on a properly encrypted platform, after all :)