Yes, that is true. (However, for private messages, if you and the other person share a key, you could encrypt the messages before sending them. For public messa

Yes, that is true. (However, for private messages, if you and the other person share a key, you could encrypt the messages before sending them. For public messages, the intention is that someone can read it, so someone being able to read whatever you put through the service is an intentional and desirable feature.) But since this communication is public, anyone should read it if they want to do, so IRC is good.