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There is still a significant difference between "the company could theoretically mitm your communications with some effort" and "tech support can read your logs

There is still a significant difference between "the company could theoretically mitm your communications with some effort" and "tech support can read your logs for the lols". Telegram is cleartext and by 2023 standards complete ass.

dijit 3y ago
I think you're still attributing more effort than is actually necessary to sideline your protection from encryption. Telegram supports open source and third party clients, so if you wanted the benefits of E2EE with a popular chat network then that's a better way to go. Custom clients on the telegram network. It is best is to use something like Element/Matrix though, for sure. But if you're trading UX for convenience then materially the difference really is a lot smaller than you imply.
- guappa 3y ago
  Let's not forget that telegram does support e2ee. And having an open source client means that you can trust it actually being e2ee much more than you can with whatsapp.
  - lxgr 3y ago
    Except that they are too cool to use peer-reviewed reasonable encryption protocols. By switching their optional E2E encryption from their weird proprietary thing to the Signal protocol, Telegram could at least display some goodwill – but only making that the default would show that they actually care about their users privacy.
    - guappa 3y ago
      e2ee comes with severe usability limitations. I'd be happy if it was available on desktop clients as well :D
      - lxgr 3y ago
        It's very usable on WhatsApp and Signal – even on the desktop clients.
        guappa 3y ago
        Last time I used whatsapp on desktop (admittedly a few years ago), the user experience was that I needed my phone around to unlock it every once in a while, because the desktop client was disconnecting every time the phone went into a deeper power save mode. The desktop client requiring me to constantly have the mobile with me defeats the purpose.
        literalAardvark 3y ago
        It doesn't do that anymore, but I'm guessing that the way it's done now comes with a privacy cost. Still... It's an excellent product. Default e2ee, notifications on partner key changes. The main thing I'd like from it would be an option to block me from sending messages until I reauthenticate the partner, or a colour coded system like threema that serves as a reminder that without authc you really don't know who you're chatting with.
- lxgr 3y ago
  > if you wanted the benefits of E2EE with a popular chat network then that's a better way to go. Custom clients on the telegram network. We already had that with OTP over ICQ/MSN/AIM etc. in the early 2000s. I could use it with about all of 3 other people. And why stop there? You can always message base64-encoded PGP messages back and forth. Problem solved! Except that defaults matter.
guappa 3y ago
I expect you do not use apple/google cloud to back up your photos and other data from your phone, right?
- lxgr 3y ago
  What does that have to do with encrypted messaging? Also, both iMessage and WhatsApp support encrypted cloud backups.
- literalAardvark 3y ago
  You are correct

dijit 3y ago

I think you're still attributing more effort than is actually necessary to sideline your protection from encryption. Telegram supports open source and third party clients, so if you wanted the benefits of E2EE with a popular chat network then that's a better way to go. Custom clients on the telegram network. It is best is to use something like Element/Matrix though, for sure. But if you're trading UX for convenience then materially the difference really is a lot smaller than you imply.

guappa 3y ago
Let's not forget that telegram does support e2ee. And having an open source client means that you can trust it actually being e2ee much more than you can with whatsapp.
- lxgr 3y ago
  Except that they are too cool to use peer-reviewed reasonable encryption protocols. By switching their optional E2E encryption from their weird proprietary thing to the Signal protocol, Telegram could at least display some goodwill – but only making that the default would show that they actually care about their users privacy.
  - guappa 3y ago
    e2ee comes with severe usability limitations. I'd be happy if it was available on desktop clients as well :D
    - lxgr 3y ago
      It's very usable on WhatsApp and Signal – even on the desktop clients.
      - guappa 3y ago
        Last time I used whatsapp on desktop (admittedly a few years ago), the user experience was that I needed my phone around to unlock it every once in a while, because the desktop client was disconnecting every time the phone went into a deeper power save mode. The desktop client requiring me to constantly have the mobile with me defeats the purpose.
        literalAardvark 3y ago
        It doesn't do that anymore, but I'm guessing that the way it's done now comes with a privacy cost. Still... It's an excellent product. Default e2ee, notifications on partner key changes. The main thing I'd like from it would be an option to block me from sending messages until I reauthenticate the partner, or a colour coded system like threema that serves as a reminder that without authc you really don't know who you're chatting with.
lxgr 3y ago
> if you wanted the benefits of E2EE with a popular chat network then that's a better way to go. Custom clients on the telegram network. We already had that with OTP over ICQ/MSN/AIM etc. in the early 2000s. I could use it with about all of 3 other people. And why stop there? You can always message base64-encoded PGP messages back and forth. Problem solved! Except that defaults matter.

guappa 3y ago

I expect you do not use apple/google cloud to back up your photos and other data from your phone, right?

lxgr 3y ago
What does that have to do with encrypted messaging? Also, both iMessage and WhatsApp support encrypted cloud backups.
literalAardvark 3y ago
You are correct