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> They’re calling it "opt-in," but it doesn't look like that's actually true? You can’t know whether someone you’re talking to -- who may not understand the imp
by Marsymars 1y ago
> They’re calling it "opt-in," but it doesn't look like that's actually true? You can’t know whether someone you’re talking to -- who may not understand the implications -- has enabled it. In group chats, it looks like a single person turning it on eliminates signal protocol for everyone in the chat.
TBF Signal already supports automated key-protected backup (and has for years), it's just stored on-device, but there's no way to know what the other party is doing with that on-device backup.
- elvisloops 1y agoThere's a big difference to me between storing it on device and someone else's servers.
- fsflover 1y agoWhy does it matter if everything is encrypted?
- fsflover 1y agoWhy am I downvoted? It seems actually encrypted, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45171740 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45171740
- Marsymars 1y agoSure, but you already have no way of knowing which one the other parties in your chats are doing. I already sync my Signal backups to the cloud, because that's the most practical and time/cost-effective way to have a 3-2-1 backup system for my chats.
- elvisloops 1y agoThere's a difference between someone in your chats acting adversarially and Signal supporting/encouraging adversarial behavior as part of the way the app works. If Signal published a change to the protocol that removed forward secrecy, we wouldn't consider it a non-event and say "well anyone could screenshot messages anyway," even though that may be true. They're calling this "secure backups," but in truth it appears to reduce security
- evbogue 1y agoI'd also wonder where this shared encryption key for message "backups" is stored. If it's available on all of my devices, I suspect it would be available on other devices as well?
- bilal4hmed 1y agoI mean it says so right in the blog post At the core of secure backups is a 64-character recovery key that is generated on your device. This key is yours and yours alone; it is never shared with Signal’s servers. Your recovery key is the only way to “unlock” your backup when you need to restore access to your messages. Losing it means losing access to your backup permanently, and Signal cannot help you recover it. You can generate a new key if you choose. We recommend storing this key securely (writing it down in a notebook or a secure password manager, for example).
- evbogue 1y agoi missed that paragraph, thanks for pointing it out. i wonder what algorithm they're using here, and if we could use third party tooling to decrypt these messages on a local computer? it might be a pathway to some cool experimental third-party Signal apps
- brewdad 1y agoThe article says it is generated on your device and they don't have a copy. Sounds like a public-private keypair where you are responsible for managing the private key.