24 ms·
This is freakin' awesome: A non-profit foundation with $50 million in the bank dedicated to providing usable encryption to the general public, with no other ag
by cs702 9y ago
This is freakin' awesome:
A non-profit foundation with $50 million in the bank dedicated to providing usable encryption to the general public, with no other agenda other than the public good.
Go read the blog post by Moxie and Brian Acton (who is joining Signal). Very exciting!
- kodablah 9y agoNot that it matters that much, but where did the 50 mil come from? I didn't see it in the post, but I may have missed it.
- tptacek 9y agoFrom Brian Acton, one of the cofounders of WhatsApp and now Executive Chairman of the Signal Foundation board.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- fossuser 9y agoIt seems like they have a lot of overlapping goals with Keybase.io. I wonder if they're in contact or work with each other.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- zapita 9y agoIsn't keybase a for-profit startup leveraging advances in cryptography to build yet another social network?
- nickik 9y agoKeybase is not really a social network. It feels much more like a sort PKI with a Slack client on top of it. The focus seems very much on Teams. However they could go into more of a social network direction, the features are basically there.
- dwighttk 9y agois it for profit?
- Avamander 9y agoNothing is monetized yet as far as I can see. I like Keybase more though, it doesn't force me to have a phone (what the hell, Signal's Linux desktop client requires that at least).
- zapita 9y agoI also like the keybase product. But when I see an ambitious, well-funded startup without a paid product or clear business model... that tells me I cannot yet trust their product, strategy or management team to endure. Next year they might be a completely different company, or might not exist at all. Since they haven't open-sourced their server, that makes it risky to rely on their products, because I don't really know what it is I'm relying on. Signal in comparison is very clear about their goals, management and business model, and I believe are 100% open-source. That gives me confidence to adopt it now, even though it's a less feature-rich product. I would love to see Signal adopt the Keybase identity-by-proof model, I think it's very clever and pragmatic.
- cornholio 9y agoI hope they eventually develop a federated, privacy oriented messaging protocol, once the rapid technological evolution settles down. I know Moxie's position on federated protocols [1], but I think we must eventually agree that an open environment with a multitude of providers and implementations is the only way to provide long term privacy - any single provider is vulnerable. It would also be a very useful tool in the context of regulating communication platforms and breaking up monopolies. [1] https://signal.org/blog/the-ecosystem-is-moving/ https://signal.org/blog/the-ecosystem-is-moving/ Edit: emphasize federated, not open, Signal is indeed an open protocol.
- tptacek 9y agoSignal Protocol is one of the best documented cryptographic message protocols on the planet, and is accompanied by multiple GPL'd implementations. https://signal.org/docs/ https://signal.org/docs/
- baby 9y agowhich sounds like it could be used to develop a federated protocol. I've heard there is an effort to do an RFC on the subject, but I'm not sure it uses the Signal protocols (for some reason), also there are two of them (I'm confused): * https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-barnes-mls-protocol-00 https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-barnes-mls-protocol-00 * https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-omara-mls-architecture-01 https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-omara-mls-architecture-01
- vader1 9y agoUsing OMEMO on XMPP is a federated implementation of the Signal protocol. I believe Matrix' e2e encryption is also based on it.
- mrmondo 9y agoI’m really hoping OMEMO makes it into Openfire (XMPP Server) and Adium (XMPP Client) sooner rather than later, we current use OTR but OMEMO is objectively superior in every way I can see.
- Cw67NTN8F 9y agoThey are also dozens of other Actons and companies that can write a $50 mil check if needed. NSA might be in trouble
- e12e 9y agoWhen you sum it up like that it sounds like a blatant op run by a clandestine agency... Sigh, trust is hard after the crypto wars.
- no_identd 9y agoIndeed. You may want to read these pages: http://secushare.org/comparison http://secushare.org/comparison http://secushare.org/anonymity http://secushare.org/anonymity http://secushare.org/answers http://secushare.org/answers
- oh_sigh 9y agoMorally, how does one weigh the implications of this, in that it will be easier for general citizens to use strong encryption, but also be easier for terrorists/ne'er-do-wells as well?