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Hong Kong people are using Telegram excessively for quite some time.

goblin89 6y ago
Given the reputation of Telegram[0][1], I hope its popularity wanes among Hong Kong people whose mindset is not aligned with furthering CCP goals. WhatsApp with its E2E-encrypted-by-default chat built on Signal protocol is the lesser evil among the popular messengers, since (1) you never risk forgetting to turn E2E on, and (2) once chat is E2E (read: always), there is no turning over of its contents to the government. Anecdotally, having lived in Hong Kong for two years, I still don’t have Telegram and am yet to meet a person who is not using WhatsApp. If WhatsApp does get banned, I hope by that time (improved) Signal and (improved and renamed) Riot offer viable alternatives. [0] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/telegram-russia-ban-lift-messaging-app-encryption-download-a9573181.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/telegram-rus... [1] https://cpj.org/2016/05/why-telegrams-security-flaws-may-put-irans-journal/ https://cpj.org/2016/05/why-telegrams-security-flaws-may-put...
- CorgiHouse 6y ago
  WhatsApp is owned by Facebook, a company known for dark patterns and lying. Between them and Telegram, I'd be more comfortable to choose the latter.
- zelphirkalt 6y ago
  Whatsapp could simple "accidentally" leak data or "accidentally" sell data to Chinese government. Since it is ow ed by Facebook and we have recently of course seen again what ethics mean to Facebook's leader, I would not put it past Whatsapp to do this.
  - goblin89 6y ago
    Unlike Telegram, WhatsApp has no recorded history of agreeing to cooperate with a government and implying capabilities of censoring E2E content. Meanwhile, the government Telegram has apparently agreed to compromise E2E in favor of appears to have closer ties with China than the US does, and seems to be testing[0] GFW-like approaches to internet censorship. [0] https://en.hromadske.ua/posts/russia-test-drives-its-great-firewall https://en.hromadske.ua/posts/russia-test-drives-its-great-f...
    - dgellow 6y ago
      > Meanwhile, the government Telegram has apparently agreed to compromise E2E in favor of appears to have closer ties with China than the US does Could you explain what makes you think that’s the case?
      - goblin89 6y ago
        Chinese hardware approved for and used in key Russian networking infrastructure[0], absence of trade/tariff war, joint large-scale strategic military drills past two years, adjacent geography, shared regime traits, etc. [0] https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2019/11/03/huawei-soars-in-russia-as-putin-engages-in-new-technological-war/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2019/11/03/huawei-so...
        solarkraft 6y ago
        I don't understand how this relates to Telegram. They have no relationship with the russian government.
        goblin89 6y ago
        You may have skipped the link in the first footnote in my top-level comment. In short: Russia has been blocking Telegram for over a year, demanding developers to compromise E2E encryption of chats. Last month Russia unblocked Telegram, and a quote attributed to its developer indicates they have developed ways to censor chats. The circumstances are hazy and there had been no clear communication from the developer. This and other issues with Telegram (some of which are mentioned elsewhere in the thread) make it, to me, not trustworthy enough for sensitive uses, Hong Kong situation included.
        dgellow 6y ago
        > Last month Russia unblocked Telegram, and a quote attributed to its developer indicates they have developed ways to censor chats. That’s a stretch. We don’t know why the ban has been removed, and it’s definitely suspicious but other reasons are possible. We are missing information to jump to “telegram compromised their end to end encryption”. Another possible explanation: Russia government doesn’t have infinite resources, spent years trying to block telegram to push them to accept their demand, that didn’t work so they stopped and are investing in other solutions.
- dastx 6y ago
  Signal for sure has improvements it can do but it's not like it's unusable. Why you would think WhatsApp, who is owned by a shady company, run by a robot, is better than signal, is beyond me.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - goblin89 6y ago
    I respect Signal. My primary rationale is that I do not routinely meet people who use it. Coupled with the reports of subpar UI, so far I have chosen not to go through the friction of setting it up and converting my conversation partners to it. Between Telegram (product co-developed by the creator of the Russian clone of Facebook, owning company of unknown organizational structure) and WhatsApp (product co-developed by co-founder and current CEO of Signal Foundation, current owning company spent a lot of time in recent years under high scrutiny), I consider the latter more trustworthy despite some of its drawbacks.
chvid 6y ago
Yes. I don't think the protester were using TikTok so I guess what TikTok is doing is mostly symbolic.

Given the reputation of Telegram[0][1], I hope its popularity wanes among Hong Kong people whose mindset is not aligned with furthering CCP goals. WhatsApp with its E2E-encrypted-by-default chat built on Signal protocol is the lesser evil among the popular messengers, since (1) you never risk forgetting to turn E2E on, and (2) once chat is E2E (read: always), there is no turning over of its contents to the government. Anecdotally, having lived in Hong Kong for two years, I still don’t have Telegram and am yet to meet a person who is not using WhatsApp. If WhatsApp does get banned, I hope by that time (improved) Signal and (improved and renamed) Riot offer viable alternatives. [0] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/telegram-russia-ban-lift-messaging-app-encryption-download-a9573181.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/telegram-rus... [1] https://cpj.org/2016/05/why-telegrams-security-flaws-may-put-irans-journal/ https://cpj.org/2016/05/why-telegrams-security-flaws-may-put...

CorgiHouse 6y ago
WhatsApp is owned by Facebook, a company known for dark patterns and lying. Between them and Telegram, I'd be more comfortable to choose the latter.
zelphirkalt 6y ago
Whatsapp could simple "accidentally" leak data or "accidentally" sell data to Chinese government. Since it is ow ed by Facebook and we have recently of course seen again what ethics mean to Facebook's leader, I would not put it past Whatsapp to do this.
- goblin89 6y ago
  Unlike Telegram, WhatsApp has no recorded history of agreeing to cooperate with a government and implying capabilities of censoring E2E content. Meanwhile, the government Telegram has apparently agreed to compromise E2E in favor of appears to have closer ties with China than the US does, and seems to be testing[0] GFW-like approaches to internet censorship. [0] https://en.hromadske.ua/posts/russia-test-drives-its-great-firewall https://en.hromadske.ua/posts/russia-test-drives-its-great-f...
  - dgellow 6y ago
    > Meanwhile, the government Telegram has apparently agreed to compromise E2E in favor of appears to have closer ties with China than the US does Could you explain what makes you think that’s the case?
    - goblin89 6y ago
      Chinese hardware approved for and used in key Russian networking infrastructure[0], absence of trade/tariff war, joint large-scale strategic military drills past two years, adjacent geography, shared regime traits, etc. [0] https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2019/11/03/huawei-soars-in-russia-as-putin-engages-in-new-technological-war/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2019/11/03/huawei-so...
      - solarkraft 6y ago
        I don't understand how this relates to Telegram. They have no relationship with the russian government.
        goblin89 6y ago
        You may have skipped the link in the first footnote in my top-level comment. In short: Russia has been blocking Telegram for over a year, demanding developers to compromise E2E encryption of chats. Last month Russia unblocked Telegram, and a quote attributed to its developer indicates they have developed ways to censor chats. The circumstances are hazy and there had been no clear communication from the developer. This and other issues with Telegram (some of which are mentioned elsewhere in the thread) make it, to me, not trustworthy enough for sensitive uses, Hong Kong situation included.
        dgellow 6y ago
        > Last month Russia unblocked Telegram, and a quote attributed to its developer indicates they have developed ways to censor chats. That’s a stretch. We don’t know why the ban has been removed, and it’s definitely suspicious but other reasons are possible. We are missing information to jump to “telegram compromised their end to end encryption”. Another possible explanation: Russia government doesn’t have infinite resources, spent years trying to block telegram to push them to accept their demand, that didn’t work so they stopped and are investing in other solutions.
dastx 6y ago
Signal for sure has improvements it can do but it's not like it's unusable. Why you would think WhatsApp, who is owned by a shady company, run by a robot, is better than signal, is beyond me.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- goblin89 6y ago
  I respect Signal. My primary rationale is that I do not routinely meet people who use it. Coupled with the reports of subpar UI, so far I have chosen not to go through the friction of setting it up and converting my conversation partners to it. Between Telegram (product co-developed by the creator of the Russian clone of Facebook, owning company of unknown organizational structure) and WhatsApp (product co-developed by co-founder and current CEO of Signal Foundation, current owning company spent a lot of time in recent years under high scrutiny), I consider the latter more trustworthy despite some of its drawbacks.

chvid 6y ago

Yes. I don't think the protester were using TikTok so I guess what TikTok is doing is mostly symbolic.