3 ms·

> Is anyone working on an "email like" app that runs on Signal? That is unlikely to ever happen as Signal doesn't allow any kind of third party clients. https:

by dngray 5y ago

> Is anyone working on an "email like" app that runs on Signal? That is unlikely to ever happen as Signal doesn't allow any kind of third party clients. https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issuecomment-217211165 https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37#issueco... That said Matrix does lend itself to this. It's also worth noting one of the major VCs (Notion) that funded that has an interest in other email companies. So who knows maybe we will see an email message client based on Matrix protocol. It certainly would be an improvement on relying on systems such as PGP and allow universal E2EE, but also E2EE to the border (required for many government/corporate) situations where auditing is required. > I'm struggling to figure out what comes after ProtonMail. It's clearly an evolutionary dead end but what succeeds it? Likely nothing. Many people that use services like this don't require anonymity. For that the threat model is absolutely fine. People seem to forget this page has existed literally since 2014: https://protonmail.com/blog/protonmail-threat-model/ https://protonmail.com/blog/protonmail-threat-model/ I think people have blown this case out of proportion without really having any facts. Minimal details are actually known the nature of what the criminal charges are about. There hasn't been any public verified information (court documents etc) pertaining to why the request was made. The most ProtonMail has said is that it was a judicial request made in Swizterland, and there was no avenue to appeal the request. Media latched on to sensationalist phrases like "climate activist" and "squatter" and those things in itself don't actually tell us very much about the nature of the charges and evidence against the suspect. Those things may not even be the reason the request was made.

hammyhavoc 5y ago
What's the difference in UX between email and IM if it is using Matrix protocol? They're even adding threading.
reginold 5y ago
That's helpful context about Signal and interesting to read the dev team's comments. While there may be many forks of Signal, the Signal team itself won't be the one to provide interoperability. Any insights from the early days of the development of email? Does LibreSignal fork, provide interoperability, and just take over, becoming the "email" of tomorrow? I'm a paying ProtonMail customer. I may be incorrect but am not distracted by the criminal charges stuff as you suggest. Protonmail stated they don't log IP on their homepage. What they meant was "unless the cops ask us". So now they've changed their marketing to update this. I'm satisfied but it also exposes the need to "trust our company", and that's just not sustainable, no matter the company.
- dngray 5y ago
  > Any insights from the early days of the development of email? Does LibreSignal fork, provide interoperability, and just take over, becoming the "email" of tomorrow? The project was discontinued. You can't develop a "Signal client" without relying on Signal servers. If you do, then you'll need your own server and there is no facility for it to talk to other servers. That pretty much makes it dead in the water. Something like Matrix which does have federation lends itself to that usecase though. > Protonmail stated they don't log IP on their homepage. What they meant was "unless the cops ask us". They don't log IPs if you don't enable advanced logs. They do however and have always said they will comply with legal requests from a Swiss court. It is in their privacy policy, https://web.archive.org/web/20210627220655/https://protonmail.com/privacy-policy https://web.archive.org/web/20210627220655/https://protonmai.... This snapshot is from earlier this year. > We will only disclose the limited user data we possess if we are instructed to do so by a fully binding request coming from the competent Swiss authorities (legal obligation). While we may comply with electronically delivered notices (see exceptions below), the disclosed data can only be used in court after we have received an original copy of the court order by registered post or in person, and provide a formal response. It's also mentioned on the threat model page https://protonmail.com/blog/protonmail-threat-model/ https://protonmail.com/blog/protonmail-threat-model/ and > The Internet is generally not anonymous, and if you are breaking Swiss law, a law-abiding company such as ProtonMail can be legally compelled to log your IP address. Also mentioned in their transparency reporting https://protonmail.com/blog/transparency-report/ https://protonmail.com/blog/transparency-report/. So that never was if the "if the cops ask". There would be many cases that are denied, and we know this from their transparency reports. The issue is some very silly people thought this meant a law abiding company would risk prosecution/contempt by not abiding by the law/courts. They failed to read any of the company's policies which have been on the website clear as day and got upset about that. The reason Protonmail is modifying their marketing is to keep people happy who don't have the attention span to learn about any of the products they use from reading any of the documentation.

by dngray 5y ago

hammyhavoc 5y ago

What's the difference in UX between email and IM if it is using Matrix protocol? They're even adding threading.

reginold 5y ago

That's helpful context about Signal and interesting to read the dev team's comments. While there may be many forks of Signal, the Signal team itself won't be the one to provide interoperability. Any insights from the early days of the development of email? Does LibreSignal fork, provide interoperability, and just take over, becoming the "email" of tomorrow? I'm a paying ProtonMail customer. I may be incorrect but am not distracted by the criminal charges stuff as you suggest. Protonmail stated they don't log IP on their homepage. What they meant was "unless the cops ask us". So now they've changed their marketing to update this. I'm satisfied but it also exposes the need to "trust our company", and that's just not sustainable, no matter the company.

dngray 5y ago
> Any insights from the early days of the development of email? Does LibreSignal fork, provide interoperability, and just take over, becoming the "email" of tomorrow? The project was discontinued. You can't develop a "Signal client" without relying on Signal servers. If you do, then you'll need your own server and there is no facility for it to talk to other servers. That pretty much makes it dead in the water. Something like Matrix which does have federation lends itself to that usecase though. > Protonmail stated they don't log IP on their homepage. What they meant was "unless the cops ask us". They don't log IPs if you don't enable advanced logs. They do however and have always said they will comply with legal requests from a Swiss court. It is in their privacy policy, https://web.archive.org/web/20210627220655/https://protonmail.com/privacy-policy https://web.archive.org/web/20210627220655/https://protonmai.... This snapshot is from earlier this year. > We will only disclose the limited user data we possess if we are instructed to do so by a fully binding request coming from the competent Swiss authorities (legal obligation). While we may comply with electronically delivered notices (see exceptions below), the disclosed data can only be used in court after we have received an original copy of the court order by registered post or in person, and provide a formal response. It's also mentioned on the threat model page https://protonmail.com/blog/protonmail-threat-model/ https://protonmail.com/blog/protonmail-threat-model/ and > The Internet is generally not anonymous, and if you are breaking Swiss law, a law-abiding company such as ProtonMail can be legally compelled to log your IP address. Also mentioned in their transparency reporting https://protonmail.com/blog/transparency-report/ https://protonmail.com/blog/transparency-report/. So that never was if the "if the cops ask". There would be many cases that are denied, and we know this from their transparency reports. The issue is some very silly people thought this meant a law abiding company would risk prosecution/contempt by not abiding by the law/courts. They failed to read any of the company's policies which have been on the website clear as day and got upset about that. The reason Protonmail is modifying their marketing is to keep people happy who don't have the attention span to learn about any of the products they use from reading any of the documentation.