4 ms·

Their solution (as documented here: https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007059752-Backup-and-Restore-Messages#ios_restore https://support.signal.org

Their solution (as documented here: https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007059752-Backup-and-Restore-Messages#ios_restore https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007059752-Ba...) requires that you place the devices "nearby" and wait for them to detect one another. For whatever reason, neither phone ever "saw" the other one (despite them being on the same network and physically next to one another). I tried this about 10 times before I finally gave up. (iPhone SE / iPhone 12 Pro) What made it more irritating was that you only get one "phone detection" attempt per account transfer process, and you're rate-limited on the server side, so I got soft-banned for 24 hours after several attempts.

tricolon 6y ago
Have you contacted their support? I did, and they informed me they'd fixed the bug in the app update that was published the next day. It might have been a coincidence, but at the very least they were responsive and knowledgeable. (I had the same issue migrating from an iPhone SE to an iPhone 12 mini.)
moxie 6y ago
Yeah, bummer. There were some iOS 14 changes that made this stop working as reliably, which was unfortunately right around the time people were getting new devices. It should be better now, and we're working on more stuff in this area.
- pgalvin 6y ago
  With respect, as I otherwise feel you’ve made an amazing app on Android and iOS, why do you allow local backups to internal storage on Android but not iOS? Enabling a backup on iOS, even if buried in advanced settings, that lets me export an encrypted .zip (for example, similar to Android) to my internal storage via the Files app would be tremendous. As it stands, I lost a very large amount of message history when an old iPhone broke. I totally understand your reasons for not enabling iCloud backup, but why not a local encrypted backup via the Files app, just like Android? Even if you feel this goes against your ethos, though I do not understand why that would only apply to iOS, it would be far better to go through a few warning messages and back up my messages than to lose years of conversations with a friend or partner who passed away. There’s hundreds upon hundreds of anecdotal stories where people value this or were burned by Signal on iOS, so clearly it is important to a large part of your existing and also potential userbase.

tricolon 6y ago

Have you contacted their support? I did, and they informed me they'd fixed the bug in the app update that was published the next day. It might have been a coincidence, but at the very least they were responsive and knowledgeable. (I had the same issue migrating from an iPhone SE to an iPhone 12 mini.)

moxie 6y ago

Yeah, bummer. There were some iOS 14 changes that made this stop working as reliably, which was unfortunately right around the time people were getting new devices. It should be better now, and we're working on more stuff in this area.

pgalvin 6y ago
With respect, as I otherwise feel you’ve made an amazing app on Android and iOS, why do you allow local backups to internal storage on Android but not iOS? Enabling a backup on iOS, even if buried in advanced settings, that lets me export an encrypted .zip (for example, similar to Android) to my internal storage via the Files app would be tremendous. As it stands, I lost a very large amount of message history when an old iPhone broke. I totally understand your reasons for not enabling iCloud backup, but why not a local encrypted backup via the Files app, just like Android? Even if you feel this goes against your ethos, though I do not understand why that would only apply to iOS, it would be far better to go through a few warning messages and back up my messages than to lose years of conversations with a friend or partner who passed away. There’s hundreds upon hundreds of anecdotal stories where people value this or were burned by Signal on iOS, so clearly it is important to a large part of your existing and also potential userbase.