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Security is not the same thing as anonymity. Maybe Signal's design goals just don't align with your requirements, and that's okay. But that doesn't mean that it
by lorenzhs 7y ago
Security is not the same thing as anonymity. Maybe Signal's design goals just don't align with your requirements, and that's okay. But that doesn't mean that it can't be the right tool for people with a different set of requirements.
- dependenttypes 7y agoSim-jacking is a thing that could damage security of future messages in the case of signal.
- tialaramex 7y agoIf you are concerned about this you can PIN lock Signal. It will prompt you periodically to confirm you still remember your PIN. When you get a new phone (or somebody tries to SIM-jack you) the new phone needs the PIN which you clearly remember because you kept entering it before. If you stop answering the PIN confirmations eventually it expires and somebody with that number can sign up (and if they want, set a new PIN). Regardless of whether you use PIN locks your contacts will be shown that something about the other party in the conversation changed, if they use in-person confirmations of identity they'll be invited to perform that over again.
- nottorp 7y agoWell, besides anonymity, my requirements for a reliable communication method include not being tied to my phone.
- UncleMeat 7y agoYes, and the huge majority of people don't have that requirement. Signal's devs have been very clear for years and years that the are optimizing for getting as many people as possible to use functioning e2e encrypted messaging rather than to focus on features that a subset of techies in the west care about.
- nottorp 7y agoI don't know about you, but I as a 'techie in the east-west' have a bunch of people who ask me or follow my choices wrt tech stuff. I might recommend Signal to them if they specifically ask for something encrypted, but if they just follow what I use they'll see no Signal.
- UncleMeat 7y agoSure. But the fact that the huge majority of messaging users use their phones is not exactly controversial. Heck, whatsapp has gotten several orders of magnitude more people to use encrypted messaging than any other software, and techies hate it.
- lorenzhs 7y agoYou are absolutely right. People on here love to crap on good solutions in search for the perfect solution, whether or not that actually solves users' problems. Case in point: your comment being greyed out. WhatsApp adopting Signal protocol probably accomplished several orders of magnitude more than anything else the Signal team has done. Of course Signal remains better for privacy, and yes, there are other messengers that don't require you to use a phone number. But for most people, using phone numbers solves so many more problems than it causes. Use the most secure messenger that works for you.