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It's frustrating to see Signal's reputation undermined in technical circles by the shortsighted zeitgeist. Signal's constitutional emphasis on usability suppor

It's frustrating to see Signal's reputation undermined in technical circles by the shortsighted zeitgeist. Signal's constitutional emphasis on usability supports user demographics that no other security product can attract. My elderly relatives use Signal now instead of Skype. This drew in other family members who just wanted to video chat with grandma and grandpa. Matrix will never win markets like this. When tech nerds nit pick Signal's implementation, they ignore that the unfederated nature of Signal limits the damage these decisions can cause. Thanks to Signal's security posture, global protection from weak ciphers, buffer overflows, and even SGX, is just one software update away. This even protects you from faults in your contact's clients! Like the key agility that makes the Axolotl Ratchet so superior to GPG, update agility makes Signal infinitely superior to every existing or proposed federated network. The Signal group has an uncompromising commitment to user privacy and a poignant security philosophy. Signal has no competition in its usability class, making hypothetical protections from other products worse than useless for user cohorts who will probably switch back to skype or sms. Signal's detractors do a terrible disservice to the people they dissuade from using it.

ryukafalz 6y ago
> When tech nerds nit pick Signal's implementation, they ignore that the unfederated nature of Signal limits the damage these decisions can cause. It limits the damage that some decisions can cause, but exacerbates others. Signal only allows the first-party client to connect to its network; if the developers were legally compelled to add a backdoor into that client, users would have few options. Its security depends on a single company being perpetually trustworthy, free of influence, and supported. Having used many chat platforms that have been shut down/acquired/etc in the past, that’s not a bet I’m willing to take. I’d also contest the idea that Matrix can never have a client as usable as Signal, but I’ll agree that there isn’t one yet.
- novok 6y ago
  Signal is OSS and you can start your own fork & network if you want to. App publishing platforms not having a good binary signature verification system is the orthogonal issue that you're bringing up, that would in many ways apply to matrix for most users too. Most will never bother to sideload it.
  - p1necone 6y ago
    > Signal is OSS and you can start your own fork & network if you want to. You can't though, what use is your own fork when nobody uses it?
    - askvictor 6y ago
      If you're really paranoid, you'd convince your contacts to use your fork.
      - dexterdog 6y ago
        I can't even convince my contacts to use signal.
        sdenton4 6y ago
        My approach is to use Signal for organizing surprise birthday parties. (or at least I did before the world went to shit.) "We need SUPER SECURITY to make sure Rob doesn't find out what's up! So we're all using Signal to plan... Join up!"
        askvictor 6y ago
        Does Rob work for the NSA?
  - ryukafalz 6y ago
    >Signal is OSS and you can start your own fork & network if you want to. Resources and network effects make this a much much less likely endeavor than in federated systems. I can reasonably (and do!) self-host Matrix and XMPP servers for myself and a few friends; I cannot reasonably host a Signal server for everyone I might want to possibly contact via Signal. (And that's setting aside the effort involved in convincing everyone I might possibly want to contact to use my Signal server. It's just not going to happen.) EDIT: Oh, and I don't think the VoIP side of the Signal server is FOSS? At least I believe that used to be the case. >App publishing platforms not having a good binary signature verification system is the orthogonal issue that you're bringing up, that would in many ways apply to matrix for most users too. Most will never bother to sideload it. If the main client developers are pressured to put a backdoor into their client, I would expect non-backdoored forks to rapidly pop up in the stores. If the platform provider is also legally pressured to not allow any non-backdoored clients into the store... well, I hope that never happens, but if we get to that point I hope more people would bother to learn more and start sideloading things. Maybe wishful thinking on my part.
- StavrosK 6y ago
  Compile your own client binary and use that?
  - ryukafalz 6y ago
    You or I can do that, but that's not something the average person is likely to be able to do. Someone could perhaps distribute their own patched client binary as well, but given Moxie/OWS's views on patched clients, I'd expect them to run into trouble at some point doing that: https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issuecomment-217211165 https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issueco...
  - sp332 6y ago
    The binaries are not obfuscated. You can analyze the official versions from the app stores for backdoors.
- crossroadsguy 6y ago
  > I’d also contest the idea that Matrix can never have a client as usable as Signal, but I’ll agree that there isn’t one yet. After being around for multiple years and having not managed to do it even once (or come close) I think I am inclined to bet they won't. Or they'd just focus on being enterprise software (which I think they are doing and they must if they want to earn money). Of all the IM apps Matrix is my most favourite in the spirit and least favourite in usability. Any attempt to introduce friends and family has failed miserably. Irony is, I myself was not convinced and I was trying to convert them.
  - ryukafalz 6y ago
    I mean, keep in mind that while Element is effectively the reference client, it's also still just one client. It's not trying to be a Signal-style messenger, it's trying to be something like Slack - and at that I'd say it succeeds. There are other clients in development that are closer UI-wise to your typical mobile messenger, e.g. https://dittochat.org/ https://dittochat.org/
    - _-___________-_ 6y ago
      Having spent a decent amount of time reading and attempting to implement small parts of the horrendous mess that is the Matrix protocol, I'd bet decent money that there will never be any reasonably complete alternatives to Element. Ditto looks nice, but is very barebones.
    - spurgu 6y ago
      > It's not trying to be a Signal-style messenger, it's trying to be something like Slack - and at that I'd say it succeeds. I'm of the completely opposite opinion I find Element absolutely atrocious compared to Slack in terms of usability The mobile app is decent though. And I don't know at what pace Element is being improved, only been using it for a couple of weeks. That said Slack has been going downhill UI/UX-wise for years now.
  - 3np 6y ago
    Even the server-side software is not feature complete yet. Give it time. Another client that I think is aiming to fill that gap (and also has a provider with bridges to eg Messenger et al) is Novachat: https://nova.chat/ https://nova.chat/ Matrix is not an IM app, it’s a protocol. Anyone is encouraged to make an app for it. It’s a long game. I’d give it another year or two before I think it’s grandma-ready.
- tych0 6y ago
  > It limits the damage that some decisions can cause, but exacerbates others. Signal only allows the first-party client to connect to its network; if the developers were legally compelled to add a backdoor into that client, users would have few options. Huh? I send messages to my friends daily using the API via https://gitlab.com/thefinn93/signald https://gitlab.com/thefinn93/signald which is definitely third party.
  - cyphar 6y ago
    Moxie has explicitly said several times that third-party clients connecting to the main Signal servers are actively not supported and has threatened to start blocking them or enforcing the Signal trademark if they get big enough. (I tried to find a link to the exact comments he's made, but the threads involved have hundreds of comments and I'm on my phone -- he said this in one of the huge Google Play issues.)
    - ryukafalz 6y ago
      Yup - you're probably thinking of this one and the other similar comments in the (mess of a) thread: https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issuecomment-217339450 https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issueco... Makes it pretty clear that OWS does not want people using third-party clients with the official Signal servers.
    - tych0 6y ago
      Huh, that sucks. Good to know, thanks!
upofadown 6y ago
>Like the key agility that makes the Axolotl Ratchet so superior to GPG, I am not sure how you can usefully compare a thing originally intended to secure email to a thing intended to secure IM. The ratchet only provides forward secrecy anyway. My take on that is that it is a pointless thing for something like email and pointless in practice for most IM applications. Most IM users keep their old messages and practically all email users keep their old messages... There is nothing particularly wrong with Signal. Some of the criticism might a reaction to the constant promotion of it over all other things, even when (as in this case) the things are fundamentally different.
- toast0 6y ago
  It provides forward secrecy and deniability. Your chat database doesn't prove that I said what your database says I said.
  - upofadown 6y ago
    Both Signal and OTR provide deniability in a narrow cryptographic sense with no real practical benefit. Cool idea though...
  - petertodd 6y ago
    For that to have any hope of working, you need easily available tools that can fake a chat database. Currently, I'm not aware of any such tools, and I'm not even sure that you can import a faked chat log into Signal on Apple iOS. In court none of that is likely to hold up anyway, as evidence like chat databases is pretty much assumed to be true until proven otherwise.
  - cyphar 6y ago
    It should be noted that (while cool from a cryptographic perspective), this security primitive is practically useless in any scenario where you might think it would be useful: * The burden of evidence to introduce chat logs in legal proceedings is much lower than you would think. Often screenshots of Facebook messages are used, or SMS records (which are also easily spoofed). A judge or jury will likely not entertain the possibility the messages were fabricated unless you have substantial evidence to the contrary. * If you're scared of national security actors discovering you've leaked some information, the fact there is a record of the secret information in the other person's phone is more than enough for them to black bag you. (And let's be honest, lack of evidence has never stopped the USA from black bagging people.) * Generally speaking, the probability of the chat record being faked is so small that no reasonable person will entertain the possibility it was faked (even though it could've been). Not to mention there are all sorts of forensic methods to prove that a particular person wrote some message using fingerprinting, and ultimately Signal LLC does actually know whether you sent a message or not and who to (though admittedly they claim they don't keep metadata logs). Now, if you're dealing with an anonymised chat system with this property then it could be argued it is practically useful. But at that point the anonymisation is doing most of the heavy lifting.
nullc 6y ago
> update agility makes Signal infinitely superior to every existing or proposed federated network. Translation: Signals ability to forcefully change the software and protocol out for users without any consent (much less informed consent) renders it functionally immune to any criticism or review because any aspect of the protocol could be changed ('improved') at a moments notice. I think signal is a fine insecure messenger. If you mistake it for a cryptographic security product you are making a significant mistake. The fact that is uses cryptographic techniques internally just means that it isn't grossly incompetently constructed, but that doesn't make it achieve any particularly strong notion of security against any particular attack model. I strongly recommend people us it (at least on devices which are already compromised by mystery meat binary updates that could be remotely backdoored at any time)... just don't think it's going to provide you with substantial security against active attackers (much less state level attackers or from Signal themselves).
- na85 6y ago
  >Translation: Signals ability to forcefully change the software and protocol out for users without any consent (much less informed consent) renders it functionally immune to any criticism or review because any aspect of the protocol could be changed ('improved') at a moments notice. What percentage of users, globally, do you suppose are qualified to make informed consent on arbitrary patches to $secure_messenger of your choosing?
  - nullc 6y ago
    Informed consent for a drug doesn't mean that you personally understand molecular biology. It usually means that you've received and understand factual information about the tradeoffs from hopefully neutral parties who are acting in your best interest and can weigh those considerations based on your own priorities and preferences. And that you can make the choice you make free of coercion, or otherwise it isn't consent at all. Signal's software management practices make the system largely opaque even to experts, and what review does happen comes at a significant lag. This is evidenced by the substantial number of times that signal has had to back-pedal on a change after substantial backlash. Even where it isn't opaque, there is no consent: the software stops running if you don't accept all changes, and seldom are changes introduced as optional features (default-on or otherwise).
walrus01 6y ago
My primary concern about Signal and usability is the insistence on using phone numbers to identify a person as a user ID. Anything that relies on SS7/PSTN working correctly is a very bad design choice in my opinion. Giving out your phone number to possibly untrusted contacts is also a bad decision because it opens up opportunities for scams, spam and social-engineering attempted hijacks of accounts (SIM swap attacks etc).
- fidelramos 6y ago
  Signal is moving to allow users registering without a phone number. The infamous PIN was a necessary step to achieve that and other features, such as proper group management, which has just been released.
  - m-p-3 6y ago
    Finally!
- elpy1 6y ago
  You might be interested in Session (https://getsession.org https://getsession.org)
kemonocode 6y ago
> Thanks to Signal's security posture, global protection from weak ciphers, buffer overflows, and even SGX, is just one software update away. Conversely, thanks to Signal's centralized model, implementations of backdoors are also one software update away. By the time the "nerds" find out, it'd probably be far too late and lives could be at stake. It's unfortunately such the nature of the beast that being half-hearted about security does not yield a half-secure product, or a product that's fully secure against half the hostile actors, it yields a product that only gives the presumption of safety, which is far more dangerous. I use many messaging services in my life as security absolutism leads to a very miserable, very paranoid life, but my expectations are accordingly tempered when I use them, and I let my contacts know my expectations too. Everyday chat? Sure. Sensitive, personal info? Maybe, depends on the exact topic. Trade/state secrets (if I were to handle them)? Hell no.
- bobbyd3 6y ago
  reputation and community trust sometimes counts for something? i get it but i also know that if the nerds find out no one would use Signal...
  - thu2111 6y ago
    If Signal's security boils down to reputation and community trust, why not just use WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger or really any chat product where the makers claim it's secure and private?
jhayward 6y ago
> The Signal group has an uncompromising commitment to user privacy Would you say that outing people who are signal users and putting them in signal contact lists without their permission is 'uncompromising commitment to user privacy?'
- elevation 6y ago
  Far from "compromise", Signal implements the only privacy conscious possibility here. Without automatic contact discovery "Signal private messenger" would be forced to default to not-private for all contacts until manual confirmation could occur. Adding UX friction to the primary use case would hinder adoption among non security-enthusiasts. With protection for the casual user eliminated, the truly sensitive communications of those motivated for privacy would stick out like a sore thumb, revealing many more bits of meta data than just "this number had signal once." Elite users who care about being "outted" simply for signal participation can take steps to mitigate. The rest of us need automatic contact discovery for Signal to not be useless.
  - jhayward 6y ago
    I think a reply that simply dismisses phone number outing as something unimportant is fairly offensive, and does not advance the case you are making.
  - cyphar 6y ago
    Alternatively, users could be given the option to opt-out of automated contact discovery so that most users have the current behaviour but people who don't want others to find out they've started using Signal (there are dozens of fairly serious situations where this could be very bad -- dismissing them like you did by calling them "elite" betrays you don't actually care about the issue being described). I mean, the fact that Signal actively notifies you when a contact registers for Signal is a complete misfeature (yes, this is basically a cosmetic complaint). It actively outs people who don't want to be outed and it's a useless notification to all of your contacts if you don't care about it.
    - 6y ago
tgsovlerkhgsel 6y ago
In general, I agree. However, their decision to force PINs broke Signal for one of my non-technical contacts, to this day (despite them supposedly offering an opt-out now). This person opens Signal, gets some weird confusing modal dialog, and is now stuck. There is supposed to be a way to opt out without having to set and remember a PIN now, but I was unable to guide this person to find it, and I can't exactly travel there to see what's on the screen and find the damn button (or figure out why it isn't showing up). So this person can no longer use Signal, and we had to fall back to WhatsApp. Which leaks more information, but has a killer feature that Signal now lacks: it allows me to communicate with this person! (For those unaware: Signal made a really boneheaded decision a couple months ago, against all specific criticism that they were receiving - they introduced PINs that would then be used to back up at least metadata to the server, protected under a questionable scheme whose security assumptions only work if SGX is unbreakable. To force users into this, they blocked access to the messenger and your messages, so you had to set a PIN and upload your data if you wanted to talk to your friends and didn't have a contact for them on a different messenger.) Intentionally breaking a product like this also breaks trust. I can no longer rely on Signal for "just wanting a video chat with Grandma and Grandpa". I can no longer trust that Moxie will make reasonable decisions, and not e.g. tomorrow break my ability to communicate with people unless I agree to upload my message history.
- DSingularity 6y ago
  Sgx is broken. Why do people not know this?
- unicornporn 6y ago
  OK, this is shit. I was not under the impression that this PIN was used to encrypt user data for storage somewhere else. That was not made clear to me.
  - orblivion 6y ago
    It would have been more clear if you had clicked the link to their web page and spent time reading a whole long document while you had other things to do. If I'm not mistaken, this PIN also allows people to hijack your account. That's kind of the point; you export here and you import on your next phone. But I'm not sure, because the whole thing is so badly explained!
tw04 6y ago
I’m not even sure how you get there. Signal can’t move my messages from my iphone to a new laptop, it’s just all gone unless I was fortunate enough to have been manually making unencrypted copies of the database on the laptop, and I’m technically literate. Saying the usability mode of: “you lose your history when you get a new device unless it happens to fall into a very narrow window” isn’t user friendly. And it has nothing to do with geeky nitpicking.
nine_k 6y ago
Centralized solutions vs federated solutions is like monarchy vs republic. Under monarchy, the power of the monarch is greatly amplifed. A great monarch can accomplish beneficial reforms at scope and speed not achievable by any republic. A bad monarch can inflict damage at scope and speed unprecedented in any republic. Equally, a centralized network can achieve colossal heights of UX, security, speed, architectural cleanliness, etc; moxie wrote a lot about that. Or it can fall into bottomless chasms of poor UX, poor functioning, and insecurity (examples are many, take maybe ICQ by the early 2000s). By construction, three's no way for a part of the network to avoid the common fate, try and find a recourse, etc. A republic (and a democracy) severely limits the power of officials it elects, more, it intentionally pitches different branches against each other in a system of checks and balances. This prevents it from achieving grandiose visions in short time, most of the time, even when the best officials are elected. It also prevents it from turning into hell, most of the time, even if some egregiously bad officials are elected to the highest offices. Same with federated networks: they offer a much less coherent UX, are more complex, less powerful, more slow, harder to upgrade — but they are also resilient against a bad actor that grabs power, for they lack a SPOF, and have a healthy nonzero amount of distrust between parts. If one part rots, others remain, and new can be made. So yes, bet on the centralized system, a brilliant benevolent dictator if you think the dictator outlives your need to use a system. Bet on moxie, Steve Jobs, or king Arthur to live effectively forever. Or bet on an open standard with a half-dozen implementations of varying quality if you think that things will inevitably go sour in some of them during your lifetime, or whatever is the time scope for your use of the system. There is no single right answer, no Goldilocks solution. Choose your poison.
macawfish 6y ago
I agree, Signal is great
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
mariojv 6y ago
I have to agree. I've convinced a non-technical group of friends to use this over SMS for group chat, and their experience so far has been delightful. Even without getting into encryption, they're delighted at its support for threading, any emoji as a reaction, and its non-corporate origins.
dybber 6y ago
My biggest annoyance with Signal is that when I send an SMS, people with Signal on an Android will not reply back with an SMS but with a Signal message. It doesn’t make any sense that I don’t get replies on the same channel as I send. This is a big usability no-go for me an the reason I’m not using Signal anymore. Don’t interfere with other messaging systems like SMS.
- dybber 6y ago
  The only way to avoid this seems to be delete your Signal account, if you just uninstall the app these contacts will still try to reach me (reply to my messages), but the messages will not be delivered as SMS as long as my account exists.
  - DenseComet 6y ago
    That seems reasonable enough. It seems like its there to prevent downgrade attacks.
  - cyphar 6y ago
    Users can explicitly send SMS messages (long press the send button and select "insecure SMS"), but this option isn't sticky -- I think if the app restarts it will again default to Signal messages. As you say, unregistering your Signal account[1] is the only permanent solution. [1]: https://signal.org/signal/unregister/ https://signal.org/signal/unregister/
1vuio0pswjnm7 6y ago
I imagine it was even more frustrating for the eavesdroppers when they could no longer listen in on the top secret discussions with your grandparents. The eavesdroppers will not give up easily though; grandparents everywhere must stay vigilant.
- 3131s 6y ago
  You're revealing your own lack of aspiration while condescending toward older people. Some people have prominent positions or intend to do important things in their life and they don't want to see personal conversations being leaked under the threat of blackmail.
  - 1vuio0pswjnm7 6y ago
    And some people have nothing better to say, over and over again, than "That software you like is [...] because my Grandmother does not use it." This is a tired trope and it's time we put it to rest. There is nothing wrong with software not intended for a "mass market".
baybal2 6y ago
Remember, Marlinspike is the guy who wrote a protocol with a built in MITM functionality, and had enough chutzpah to call it end-to-end encryption, and said that UI feedback for key changes will "confuse users." A bad, and weak encryption scheme he wants. It's like the previous discredited idea: "let's put SSL/TLS everywhere, but trust self signed certs because otherwise we will confuse users"
stubish 6y ago
I agree that an emphasis on usability is required, and that is why Zoom now rules. My elderly relatives use Zoom exclusively, partly because that is what they are invited to use for the 80th birthday celebrations that seem to happen every week. But also because they don't have smart phones; they are somewhat comfortable with a desktop computer, but smart phones are just unusable due to lack of dexterity, poorer eyesight and worse user interfaces. I can't see a mobile-only solution winning family use cases. Maybe it will do better with business.

ryukafalz 6y ago

> When tech nerds nit pick Signal's implementation, they ignore that the unfederated nature of Signal limits the damage these decisions can cause. It limits the damage that some decisions can cause, but exacerbates others. Signal only allows the first-party client to connect to its network; if the developers were legally compelled to add a backdoor into that client, users would have few options. Its security depends on a single company being perpetually trustworthy, free of influence, and supported. Having used many chat platforms that have been shut down/acquired/etc in the past, that’s not a bet I’m willing to take. I’d also contest the idea that Matrix can never have a client as usable as Signal, but I’ll agree that there isn’t one yet.

novok 6y ago
Signal is OSS and you can start your own fork & network if you want to. App publishing platforms not having a good binary signature verification system is the orthogonal issue that you're bringing up, that would in many ways apply to matrix for most users too. Most will never bother to sideload it.
- p1necone 6y ago
  > Signal is OSS and you can start your own fork & network if you want to. You can't though, what use is your own fork when nobody uses it?
  - askvictor 6y ago
    If you're really paranoid, you'd convince your contacts to use your fork.
    - dexterdog 6y ago
      I can't even convince my contacts to use signal.
      - sdenton4 6y ago
        My approach is to use Signal for organizing surprise birthday parties. (or at least I did before the world went to shit.) "We need SUPER SECURITY to make sure Rob doesn't find out what's up! So we're all using Signal to plan... Join up!"
        askvictor 6y ago
        Does Rob work for the NSA?
- ryukafalz 6y ago
  >Signal is OSS and you can start your own fork & network if you want to. Resources and network effects make this a much much less likely endeavor than in federated systems. I can reasonably (and do!) self-host Matrix and XMPP servers for myself and a few friends; I cannot reasonably host a Signal server for everyone I might want to possibly contact via Signal. (And that's setting aside the effort involved in convincing everyone I might possibly want to contact to use my Signal server. It's just not going to happen.) EDIT: Oh, and I don't think the VoIP side of the Signal server is FOSS? At least I believe that used to be the case. >App publishing platforms not having a good binary signature verification system is the orthogonal issue that you're bringing up, that would in many ways apply to matrix for most users too. Most will never bother to sideload it. If the main client developers are pressured to put a backdoor into their client, I would expect non-backdoored forks to rapidly pop up in the stores. If the platform provider is also legally pressured to not allow any non-backdoored clients into the store... well, I hope that never happens, but if we get to that point I hope more people would bother to learn more and start sideloading things. Maybe wishful thinking on my part.
StavrosK 6y ago
Compile your own client binary and use that?
- ryukafalz 6y ago
  You or I can do that, but that's not something the average person is likely to be able to do. Someone could perhaps distribute their own patched client binary as well, but given Moxie/OWS's views on patched clients, I'd expect them to run into trouble at some point doing that: https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issuecomment-217211165 https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issueco...
- sp332 6y ago
  The binaries are not obfuscated. You can analyze the official versions from the app stores for backdoors.
crossroadsguy 6y ago
> I’d also contest the idea that Matrix can never have a client as usable as Signal, but I’ll agree that there isn’t one yet. After being around for multiple years and having not managed to do it even once (or come close) I think I am inclined to bet they won't. Or they'd just focus on being enterprise software (which I think they are doing and they must if they want to earn money). Of all the IM apps Matrix is my most favourite in the spirit and least favourite in usability. Any attempt to introduce friends and family has failed miserably. Irony is, I myself was not convinced and I was trying to convert them.
- ryukafalz 6y ago
  I mean, keep in mind that while Element is effectively the reference client, it's also still just one client. It's not trying to be a Signal-style messenger, it's trying to be something like Slack - and at that I'd say it succeeds. There are other clients in development that are closer UI-wise to your typical mobile messenger, e.g. https://dittochat.org/ https://dittochat.org/
  - _-___________-_ 6y ago
    Having spent a decent amount of time reading and attempting to implement small parts of the horrendous mess that is the Matrix protocol, I'd bet decent money that there will never be any reasonably complete alternatives to Element. Ditto looks nice, but is very barebones.
  - spurgu 6y ago
    > It's not trying to be a Signal-style messenger, it's trying to be something like Slack - and at that I'd say it succeeds. I'm of the completely opposite opinion I find Element absolutely atrocious compared to Slack in terms of usability The mobile app is decent though. And I don't know at what pace Element is being improved, only been using it for a couple of weeks. That said Slack has been going downhill UI/UX-wise for years now.
- 3np 6y ago
  Even the server-side software is not feature complete yet. Give it time. Another client that I think is aiming to fill that gap (and also has a provider with bridges to eg Messenger et al) is Novachat: https://nova.chat/ https://nova.chat/ Matrix is not an IM app, it’s a protocol. Anyone is encouraged to make an app for it. It’s a long game. I’d give it another year or two before I think it’s grandma-ready.
tych0 6y ago
> It limits the damage that some decisions can cause, but exacerbates others. Signal only allows the first-party client to connect to its network; if the developers were legally compelled to add a backdoor into that client, users would have few options. Huh? I send messages to my friends daily using the API via https://gitlab.com/thefinn93/signald https://gitlab.com/thefinn93/signald which is definitely third party.
- cyphar 6y ago
  Moxie has explicitly said several times that third-party clients connecting to the main Signal servers are actively not supported and has threatened to start blocking them or enforcing the Signal trademark if they get big enough. (I tried to find a link to the exact comments he's made, but the threads involved have hundreds of comments and I'm on my phone -- he said this in one of the huge Google Play issues.)
  - ryukafalz 6y ago
    Yup - you're probably thinking of this one and the other similar comments in the (mess of a) thread: https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issuecomment-217339450 https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issueco... Makes it pretty clear that OWS does not want people using third-party clients with the official Signal servers.
  - tych0 6y ago
    Huh, that sucks. Good to know, thanks!

upofadown 6y ago

>Like the key agility that makes the Axolotl Ratchet so superior to GPG, I am not sure how you can usefully compare a thing originally intended to secure email to a thing intended to secure IM. The ratchet only provides forward secrecy anyway. My take on that is that it is a pointless thing for something like email and pointless in practice for most IM applications. Most IM users keep their old messages and practically all email users keep their old messages... There is nothing particularly wrong with Signal. Some of the criticism might a reaction to the constant promotion of it over all other things, even when (as in this case) the things are fundamentally different.

toast0 6y ago
It provides forward secrecy and deniability. Your chat database doesn't prove that I said what your database says I said.
- upofadown 6y ago
  Both Signal and OTR provide deniability in a narrow cryptographic sense with no real practical benefit. Cool idea though...
- petertodd 6y ago
  For that to have any hope of working, you need easily available tools that can fake a chat database. Currently, I'm not aware of any such tools, and I'm not even sure that you can import a faked chat log into Signal on Apple iOS. In court none of that is likely to hold up anyway, as evidence like chat databases is pretty much assumed to be true until proven otherwise.
- cyphar 6y ago
  It should be noted that (while cool from a cryptographic perspective), this security primitive is practically useless in any scenario where you might think it would be useful: * The burden of evidence to introduce chat logs in legal proceedings is much lower than you would think. Often screenshots of Facebook messages are used, or SMS records (which are also easily spoofed). A judge or jury will likely not entertain the possibility the messages were fabricated unless you have substantial evidence to the contrary. * If you're scared of national security actors discovering you've leaked some information, the fact there is a record of the secret information in the other person's phone is more than enough for them to black bag you. (And let's be honest, lack of evidence has never stopped the USA from black bagging people.) * Generally speaking, the probability of the chat record being faked is so small that no reasonable person will entertain the possibility it was faked (even though it could've been). Not to mention there are all sorts of forensic methods to prove that a particular person wrote some message using fingerprinting, and ultimately Signal LLC does actually know whether you sent a message or not and who to (though admittedly they claim they don't keep metadata logs). Now, if you're dealing with an anonymised chat system with this property then it could be argued it is practically useful. But at that point the anonymisation is doing most of the heavy lifting.

nullc 6y ago

> update agility makes Signal infinitely superior to every existing or proposed federated network. Translation: Signals ability to forcefully change the software and protocol out for users without any consent (much less informed consent) renders it functionally immune to any criticism or review because any aspect of the protocol could be changed ('improved') at a moments notice. I think signal is a fine insecure messenger. If you mistake it for a cryptographic security product you are making a significant mistake. The fact that is uses cryptographic techniques internally just means that it isn't grossly incompetently constructed, but that doesn't make it achieve any particularly strong notion of security against any particular attack model. I strongly recommend people us it (at least on devices which are already compromised by mystery meat binary updates that could be remotely backdoored at any time)... just don't think it's going to provide you with substantial security against active attackers (much less state level attackers or from Signal themselves).

na85 6y ago
>Translation: Signals ability to forcefully change the software and protocol out for users without any consent (much less informed consent) renders it functionally immune to any criticism or review because any aspect of the protocol could be changed ('improved') at a moments notice. What percentage of users, globally, do you suppose are qualified to make informed consent on arbitrary patches to $secure_messenger of your choosing?
- nullc 6y ago
  Informed consent for a drug doesn't mean that you personally understand molecular biology. It usually means that you've received and understand factual information about the tradeoffs from hopefully neutral parties who are acting in your best interest and can weigh those considerations based on your own priorities and preferences. And that you can make the choice you make free of coercion, or otherwise it isn't consent at all. Signal's software management practices make the system largely opaque even to experts, and what review does happen comes at a significant lag. This is evidenced by the substantial number of times that signal has had to back-pedal on a change after substantial backlash. Even where it isn't opaque, there is no consent: the software stops running if you don't accept all changes, and seldom are changes introduced as optional features (default-on or otherwise).

walrus01 6y ago

My primary concern about Signal and usability is the insistence on using phone numbers to identify a person as a user ID. Anything that relies on SS7/PSTN working correctly is a very bad design choice in my opinion. Giving out your phone number to possibly untrusted contacts is also a bad decision because it opens up opportunities for scams, spam and social-engineering attempted hijacks of accounts (SIM swap attacks etc).

fidelramos 6y ago
Signal is moving to allow users registering without a phone number. The infamous PIN was a necessary step to achieve that and other features, such as proper group management, which has just been released.
- m-p-3 6y ago
  Finally!
elpy1 6y ago
You might be interested in Session (https://getsession.org https://getsession.org)

kemonocode 6y ago

> Thanks to Signal's security posture, global protection from weak ciphers, buffer overflows, and even SGX, is just one software update away. Conversely, thanks to Signal's centralized model, implementations of backdoors are also one software update away. By the time the "nerds" find out, it'd probably be far too late and lives could be at stake. It's unfortunately such the nature of the beast that being half-hearted about security does not yield a half-secure product, or a product that's fully secure against half the hostile actors, it yields a product that only gives the presumption of safety, which is far more dangerous. I use many messaging services in my life as security absolutism leads to a very miserable, very paranoid life, but my expectations are accordingly tempered when I use them, and I let my contacts know my expectations too. Everyday chat? Sure. Sensitive, personal info? Maybe, depends on the exact topic. Trade/state secrets (if I were to handle them)? Hell no.

bobbyd3 6y ago
reputation and community trust sometimes counts for something? i get it but i also know that if the nerds find out no one would use Signal...
- thu2111 6y ago
  If Signal's security boils down to reputation and community trust, why not just use WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger or really any chat product where the makers claim it's secure and private?

jhayward 6y ago

> The Signal group has an uncompromising commitment to user privacy Would you say that outing people who are signal users and putting them in signal contact lists without their permission is 'uncompromising commitment to user privacy?'

elevation 6y ago
Far from "compromise", Signal implements the only privacy conscious possibility here. Without automatic contact discovery "Signal private messenger" would be forced to default to not-private for all contacts until manual confirmation could occur. Adding UX friction to the primary use case would hinder adoption among non security-enthusiasts. With protection for the casual user eliminated, the truly sensitive communications of those motivated for privacy would stick out like a sore thumb, revealing many more bits of meta data than just "this number had signal once." Elite users who care about being "outted" simply for signal participation can take steps to mitigate. The rest of us need automatic contact discovery for Signal to not be useless.
- jhayward 6y ago
  I think a reply that simply dismisses phone number outing as something unimportant is fairly offensive, and does not advance the case you are making.
- cyphar 6y ago
  Alternatively, users could be given the option to opt-out of automated contact discovery so that most users have the current behaviour but people who don't want others to find out they've started using Signal (there are dozens of fairly serious situations where this could be very bad -- dismissing them like you did by calling them "elite" betrays you don't actually care about the issue being described). I mean, the fact that Signal actively notifies you when a contact registers for Signal is a complete misfeature (yes, this is basically a cosmetic complaint). It actively outs people who don't want to be outed and it's a useless notification to all of your contacts if you don't care about it.
  - 6y ago

tgsovlerkhgsel 6y ago

In general, I agree. However, their decision to force PINs broke Signal for one of my non-technical contacts, to this day (despite them supposedly offering an opt-out now). This person opens Signal, gets some weird confusing modal dialog, and is now stuck. There is supposed to be a way to opt out without having to set and remember a PIN now, but I was unable to guide this person to find it, and I can't exactly travel there to see what's on the screen and find the damn button (or figure out why it isn't showing up). So this person can no longer use Signal, and we had to fall back to WhatsApp. Which leaks more information, but has a killer feature that Signal now lacks: it allows me to communicate with this person! (For those unaware: Signal made a really boneheaded decision a couple months ago, against all specific criticism that they were receiving - they introduced PINs that would then be used to back up at least metadata to the server, protected under a questionable scheme whose security assumptions only work if SGX is unbreakable. To force users into this, they blocked access to the messenger and your messages, so you had to set a PIN and upload your data if you wanted to talk to your friends and didn't have a contact for them on a different messenger.) Intentionally breaking a product like this also breaks trust. I can no longer rely on Signal for "just wanting a video chat with Grandma and Grandpa". I can no longer trust that Moxie will make reasonable decisions, and not e.g. tomorrow break my ability to communicate with people unless I agree to upload my message history.

DSingularity 6y ago
Sgx is broken. Why do people not know this?
unicornporn 6y ago
OK, this is shit. I was not under the impression that this PIN was used to encrypt user data for storage somewhere else. That was not made clear to me.
- orblivion 6y ago
  It would have been more clear if you had clicked the link to their web page and spent time reading a whole long document while you had other things to do. If I'm not mistaken, this PIN also allows people to hijack your account. That's kind of the point; you export here and you import on your next phone. But I'm not sure, because the whole thing is so badly explained!

tw04 6y ago

I’m not even sure how you get there. Signal can’t move my messages from my iphone to a new laptop, it’s just all gone unless I was fortunate enough to have been manually making unencrypted copies of the database on the laptop, and I’m technically literate. Saying the usability mode of: “you lose your history when you get a new device unless it happens to fall into a very narrow window” isn’t user friendly. And it has nothing to do with geeky nitpicking.

nine_k 6y ago

Centralized solutions vs federated solutions is like monarchy vs republic. Under monarchy, the power of the monarch is greatly amplifed. A great monarch can accomplish beneficial reforms at scope and speed not achievable by any republic. A bad monarch can inflict damage at scope and speed unprecedented in any republic. Equally, a centralized network can achieve colossal heights of UX, security, speed, architectural cleanliness, etc; moxie wrote a lot about that. Or it can fall into bottomless chasms of poor UX, poor functioning, and insecurity (examples are many, take maybe ICQ by the early 2000s). By construction, three's no way for a part of the network to avoid the common fate, try and find a recourse, etc. A republic (and a democracy) severely limits the power of officials it elects, more, it intentionally pitches different branches against each other in a system of checks and balances. This prevents it from achieving grandiose visions in short time, most of the time, even when the best officials are elected. It also prevents it from turning into hell, most of the time, even if some egregiously bad officials are elected to the highest offices. Same with federated networks: they offer a much less coherent UX, are more complex, less powerful, more slow, harder to upgrade — but they are also resilient against a bad actor that grabs power, for they lack a SPOF, and have a healthy nonzero amount of distrust between parts. If one part rots, others remain, and new can be made. So yes, bet on the centralized system, a brilliant benevolent dictator if you think the dictator outlives your need to use a system. Bet on moxie, Steve Jobs, or king Arthur to live effectively forever. Or bet on an open standard with a half-dozen implementations of varying quality if you think that things will inevitably go sour in some of them during your lifetime, or whatever is the time scope for your use of the system. There is no single right answer, no Goldilocks solution. Choose your poison.

macawfish 6y ago

I agree, Signal is great

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

mariojv 6y ago

I have to agree. I've convinced a non-technical group of friends to use this over SMS for group chat, and their experience so far has been delightful. Even without getting into encryption, they're delighted at its support for threading, any emoji as a reaction, and its non-corporate origins.

dybber 6y ago

My biggest annoyance with Signal is that when I send an SMS, people with Signal on an Android will not reply back with an SMS but with a Signal message. It doesn’t make any sense that I don’t get replies on the same channel as I send. This is a big usability no-go for me an the reason I’m not using Signal anymore. Don’t interfere with other messaging systems like SMS.

dybber 6y ago
The only way to avoid this seems to be delete your Signal account, if you just uninstall the app these contacts will still try to reach me (reply to my messages), but the messages will not be delivered as SMS as long as my account exists.
- DenseComet 6y ago
  That seems reasonable enough. It seems like its there to prevent downgrade attacks.
- cyphar 6y ago
  Users can explicitly send SMS messages (long press the send button and select "insecure SMS"), but this option isn't sticky -- I think if the app restarts it will again default to Signal messages. As you say, unregistering your Signal account[1] is the only permanent solution. [1]: https://signal.org/signal/unregister/ https://signal.org/signal/unregister/

1vuio0pswjnm7 6y ago

I imagine it was even more frustrating for the eavesdroppers when they could no longer listen in on the top secret discussions with your grandparents. The eavesdroppers will not give up easily though; grandparents everywhere must stay vigilant.

3131s 6y ago
You're revealing your own lack of aspiration while condescending toward older people. Some people have prominent positions or intend to do important things in their life and they don't want to see personal conversations being leaked under the threat of blackmail.
- 1vuio0pswjnm7 6y ago
  And some people have nothing better to say, over and over again, than "That software you like is [...] because my Grandmother does not use it." This is a tired trope and it's time we put it to rest. There is nothing wrong with software not intended for a "mass market".

baybal2 6y ago

Remember, Marlinspike is the guy who wrote a protocol with a built in MITM functionality, and had enough chutzpah to call it end-to-end encryption, and said that UI feedback for key changes will "confuse users." A bad, and weak encryption scheme he wants. It's like the previous discredited idea: "let's put SSL/TLS everywhere, but trust self signed certs because otherwise we will confuse users"

stubish 6y ago

I agree that an emphasis on usability is required, and that is why Zoom now rules. My elderly relatives use Zoom exclusively, partly because that is what they are invited to use for the 80th birthday celebrations that seem to happen every week. But also because they don't have smart phones; they are somewhat comfortable with a desktop computer, but smart phones are just unusable due to lack of dexterity, poorer eyesight and worse user interfaces. I can't see a mobile-only solution winning family use cases. Maybe it will do better with business.