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Stick to messenger apps. It's tough, I know, because of network effects, but I managed to convert about 20 friends of mine to use Signal. I deliberately avoid F

Stick to messenger apps. It's tough, I know, because of network effects, but I managed to convert about 20 friends of mine to use Signal. I deliberately avoid Facebook Messenger and Whatsapp since they can be intercepted easily, and if you're caught making a joke about ISIS, the Whatsapp police can unencrypt your messages which kinda sucks. Instant messages are more personal and you're not broadcasting your life to 5000 randos, who could potentially weaponize that data if they wanted (potential employer saw your meme about binge drinking & alcohol consumption? Too bad).

cameronperot 5y ago
> if you're caught making a joke about ISIS, the Whatsapp police can unencrypt your messages Would you please clarify this? I know that messages flagged by the recipient can be read by moderators [1], but I'm not exactly sure what you're getting at here. I'm not defending WhatsApp (I've advocated for Signal since the days of TextSecure), but AFAIK the messages are encrypted using the Signal protocol, so I'm not sure how the "WhatsApp police" would be able to determine if you said something specific without the recipient reporting it. [1] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/09/whatsapp-end-to-end-encrypted-messages-arent-that-private-after-all/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/09/whatsapp-end-to-end-...
- sysadm1n 5y ago
  Yes I was referring to this when I meant the `Whatsapp police`. I actually tried to dig up the article to backup my claims, but was at a loss, since I didn't bookmark it. So in this case we have Whatsapp users essentially snitching on each other and getting posts flagged for the purposes of law enforcement, and having those message unencrypted. Whilst this is largely helpful, there is the potential for false positives (e.g a meme about ISIS getting flagged as 'extremist' and 'violent') It's a tricky one, because although the feature may help save lives and such, I am just uncomfortable with it, since the E2E encryption is slightly broken because of this mechanism in place.

cameronperot 5y ago

> if you're caught making a joke about ISIS, the Whatsapp police can unencrypt your messages Would you please clarify this? I know that messages flagged by the recipient can be read by moderators [1], but I'm not exactly sure what you're getting at here. I'm not defending WhatsApp (I've advocated for Signal since the days of TextSecure), but AFAIK the messages are encrypted using the Signal protocol, so I'm not sure how the "WhatsApp police" would be able to determine if you said something specific without the recipient reporting it. [1] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/09/whatsapp-end-to-end-encrypted-messages-arent-that-private-after-all/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/09/whatsapp-end-to-end-...

sysadm1n 5y ago
Yes I was referring to this when I meant the `Whatsapp police`. I actually tried to dig up the article to backup my claims, but was at a loss, since I didn't bookmark it. So in this case we have Whatsapp users essentially snitching on each other and getting posts flagged for the purposes of law enforcement, and having those message unencrypted. Whilst this is largely helpful, there is the potential for false positives (e.g a meme about ISIS getting flagged as 'extremist' and 'violent') It's a tricky one, because although the feature may help save lives and such, I am just uncomfortable with it, since the E2E encryption is slightly broken because of this mechanism in place.