5 ms·

Afaik TextSecures server infrastructure consists mainly of Google Play Services which comes at no financial costs for them but with the downside of depending on

by phaer 12y ago

Afaik TextSecures server infrastructure consists mainly of Google Play Services which comes at no financial costs for them but with the downside of depending on Google to temporary store encrypted text.

makomk 12y ago
Yeah. The more substantial downside is that Google effectively has remote root access to every device which holds decryption keys for that text. That's not exactly ideal.
- xyzzy123 12y ago
  I would be interested in your thoughts on alternative platforms / firmware /ecosystems which get around this?
  - jevinskie 12y ago
    Perhaps using Paranoid Android (if supported on your phone) would be a start.
dublinben 12y ago
I would rather pay a nominal fee to support their infrastructure than have to rely on Google Play Services for a supposedly "secure" messaging service.
- phaer 12y ago
  I see you point but it should not weaken the security because encryption happens at the client, Google "only" gets metadata which at least authorities will get anyway. Besides, TextSecure is free software so it might possible to run your own server at least in the future.
  - higherpurpose 12y ago
    Google gets the metadata? That's news to me. I thought the metadata was encrypted by the TextSecure server?
    - phaer 12y ago
      I don't know, but I would have guessed that Google needs to know when it should deliver a message and where it should go, no? That is metadata in my definition.
      - jlund 12y ago
        GCM payloads are fully encrypted. Google would be able to tell that you are a TextSecure user who is receiving a message, but they cannot tell who the message is coming from nor can they look at its contents (obviously).
        avn2109 12y ago
        But crucially, this will still be vulnerable to timing attacks, if I'm not mistaken.
        tptacek 12y ago
        What's the specific timing attack you're considering here?
        nialo 12y ago
        There may not be the traditional byte at a time comparison type timing attack, but maybe this is still vulnerable to timing correlation attacks in the same sense that tor is. That is, Google or someone monitoring Google's network can look at all the messages and see who is talking to whom by matching up timing and encrypted message bodies.
        e12e 12y ago
jlund 12y ago
This isn't entirely true. A detailed explanation is available in the Open WhisperSystems Support Center [1] and several solutions are in the works. Google's GCM push messaging framework is used only for message delivery; the TextSecure server itself is open source [2]. [1] http://support.whispersystems.org/customer/portal/articles/1476204-why-do-i-need-google-play-installed-to-use-textsecure-on-android- http://support.whispersystems.org/customer/portal/articles/1... [2] https://github.com/WhisperSystems/TextSecure-Server https://github.com/WhisperSystems/TextSecure-Server
- acqq 12y ago
  It's true currently. At the support page you link first it is promised that it will be eventually changed but now: "Outside of Google's GCM, the fact is that there are no alternative push messaging frameworks for Android that can scale to the millions of users that TextSecure has. GCM requires Google Play." Note, the page confirms: Google Play still has to be installed to use TextSecure on Android. That is the current state. Google has practically the root access to the every Android device which runs TextSecure.
  - jlund 12y ago
    Full disclosure: I wrote that Support Center article. The comment I was replying to made it sound as though TextSecure's infrastructure is almost entirely Google-based. It is not, and that's what I meant when I said "This isn't entirely true." The server is open source and it already includes preliminary support for WebSockets and Apple's APN push messaging network. Google's GCM is merely one component, and alternatives are being worked on. Apple also has root access to all iOS devices via their over-the-air update framework. Opaque basebands and graphics chips with closed source drivers are difficult to trust too. None of these scenarios mean that software which offers serious improvements over the status quo should be casually dismissed. TextSecure can (and does) provide significant protection from mass surveillance and targeted surveillance. Security nihilism is corrosive.
    - acqq 12y ago
      So it's still true that currently the sever side uses only Google servers. It's nice to hear that there's work on the alternatives. What you call "nihilism" is simply the observation of the current state. At the moment Google has root access and all the metadata of all TextSecure users, and currently the user can't configure TextSecure to use some other servers even if he'd prefer to do so. Still I'm glad that I've seen that some server-side code is now open source.

by phaer 12y ago

makomk 12y ago

Yeah. The more substantial downside is that Google effectively has remote root access to every device which holds decryption keys for that text. That's not exactly ideal.

xyzzy123 12y ago
I would be interested in your thoughts on alternative platforms / firmware /ecosystems which get around this?
- jevinskie 12y ago
  Perhaps using Paranoid Android (if supported on your phone) would be a start.

dublinben 12y ago

I would rather pay a nominal fee to support their infrastructure than have to rely on Google Play Services for a supposedly "secure" messaging service.

phaer 12y ago
I see you point but it should not weaken the security because encryption happens at the client, Google "only" gets metadata which at least authorities will get anyway. Besides, TextSecure is free software so it might possible to run your own server at least in the future.
- higherpurpose 12y ago
  Google gets the metadata? That's news to me. I thought the metadata was encrypted by the TextSecure server?
  - phaer 12y ago
    I don't know, but I would have guessed that Google needs to know when it should deliver a message and where it should go, no? That is metadata in my definition.
    - jlund 12y ago
      GCM payloads are fully encrypted. Google would be able to tell that you are a TextSecure user who is receiving a message, but they cannot tell who the message is coming from nor can they look at its contents (obviously).
      - avn2109 12y ago
        But crucially, this will still be vulnerable to timing attacks, if I'm not mistaken.
        tptacek 12y ago
        What's the specific timing attack you're considering here?
        nialo 12y ago
        There may not be the traditional byte at a time comparison type timing attack, but maybe this is still vulnerable to timing correlation attacks in the same sense that tor is. That is, Google or someone monitoring Google's network can look at all the messages and see who is talking to whom by matching up timing and encrypted message bodies.
        e12e 12y ago

jlund 12y ago

This isn't entirely true. A detailed explanation is available in the Open WhisperSystems Support Center [1] and several solutions are in the works. Google's GCM push messaging framework is used only for message delivery; the TextSecure server itself is open source [2]. [1] http://support.whispersystems.org/customer/portal/articles/1476204-why-do-i-need-google-play-installed-to-use-textsecure-on-android- http://support.whispersystems.org/customer/portal/articles/1... [2] https://github.com/WhisperSystems/TextSecure-Server https://github.com/WhisperSystems/TextSecure-Server

acqq 12y ago
It's true currently. At the support page you link first it is promised that it will be eventually changed but now: "Outside of Google's GCM, the fact is that there are no alternative push messaging frameworks for Android that can scale to the millions of users that TextSecure has. GCM requires Google Play." Note, the page confirms: Google Play still has to be installed to use TextSecure on Android. That is the current state. Google has practically the root access to the every Android device which runs TextSecure.
- jlund 12y ago
  Full disclosure: I wrote that Support Center article. The comment I was replying to made it sound as though TextSecure's infrastructure is almost entirely Google-based. It is not, and that's what I meant when I said "This isn't entirely true." The server is open source and it already includes preliminary support for WebSockets and Apple's APN push messaging network. Google's GCM is merely one component, and alternatives are being worked on. Apple also has root access to all iOS devices via their over-the-air update framework. Opaque basebands and graphics chips with closed source drivers are difficult to trust too. None of these scenarios mean that software which offers serious improvements over the status quo should be casually dismissed. TextSecure can (and does) provide significant protection from mass surveillance and targeted surveillance. Security nihilism is corrosive.
  - acqq 12y ago
    So it's still true that currently the sever side uses only Google servers. It's nice to hear that there's work on the alternatives. What you call "nihilism" is simply the observation of the current state. At the moment Google has root access and all the metadata of all TextSecure users, and currently the user can't configure TextSecure to use some other servers even if he'd prefer to do so. Still I'm glad that I've seen that some server-side code is now open source.