“When you use Signal, your data is stored in encrypted form on your devices. The only information that is stored on the Signal servers for each account is the phone number you registered with, the date and time you joined the service, and the date you last logged on.”
This isn’t an ad, I wasn’t paid for this post. Just to clear the air: fuck facebook, fuck elon musk and twitter, fuck anyone who thinks this is a paid advertisement. I wish I was paid for this shit, I just wanted to spread the word. Thank you. 😀 👍
I use Signal but it’s on its own path to becoming enshittified too. Less like Reddit, more like Firefox, the people in charge are just clueless about the signal userbase.
It won’t be long until there’s a shift to an alternative because the current president of the signal foundation is one step away from turning it into Snapchat.
Instead of pumping money into increasing awareness or enhancing reliability of the service, the Signal team have wasted effort on features that nobody asked for, including its very own crypto shitcoin (a major red flag for any company). They also remove features people relied on, such as SMS support.
It’s hard to trust the Signal team when they continually disappoint in such egregious ways.
I pretty much dropped Signal after they announced they were losing SMS support. It’s hard enough to sell my peers on another messaging app as it is, and Signal’s UI choices have been frustrating from the get go.
For what it’s worth, Google has picked up the same or better end-to-end encryption as Signal for users of its default messenger but will likely never do away with SMS support.
https://9to5google.com/2023/03/24/messaging-is-not-androids-mess-iphone-problem-with-lockheimer/
I just absolutely do not trust google.
That said I convinced a member of my family to join signal and we text on there for a bit and then the connection broke. Like we could not text anymore nothing would go from me to them it would just stay in limbo as sent.
Oh no…
I’ve switched to a dumb Nokia phone two years ago, so can’t use signal but I’ve always liked the service, I’m so sad to hear that… I’ve always assumed that one day I’ll be getting the Punkt Pigeon phone, but these news are making me reconsider. Oh, no SMS support. Then there’s zero reason to use signal, then. I’m never convincing all of my friends to switch, and I don’t need another messaging app for the two that do.
I thought that they do know what they’re doing, but crypto? Really? I wouldn’t mind if they moved Signal to use smart contracts for messaging, but call they have to come up with is crypto? Lol.
I wouldn’t mind if they moved Signal to use smart contracts for messaging, but call they have to come up with is crypto? Lol.
You do not need crypto to call with it. It is simply a payment mechanism. I don’t see anything wrong with it. If anyone is uninterested, they can simply turn it off or not use it. Conversely, burning up fees to interact with smart contracts to message is what seems more silly to me. There’d be no opting out of that.
You are right, I always forget about the fuel cost. Ever since I learned how blockchain and smart contracts work, I really really want to like that idea. But I can’t come up with almost anything aside from like voting that would not be better done in a centralized way, and would be suitable for mass and prolonged use. That was why I mentioned it, because maybe it would’ve worked to use smart contracts from messaging. But then again, storing data and fuel is expensive, so it’s again a bad idea.
I still wish they hadn’t dropped sms on android. A few family members dropped signal as soon as they needed another app for messaging.
I still don’t understand why they did that, I used to use Signal for everything and while it was clear that it couldn’t encrypt basic SMS I could at least do all my messaging in one place. Now, I can’t communicate with 80% of my contacts via Signal even if I wanted to, forcing two separate messaging apps.
Just let me send unsecured messages. It’s fine. As it stands now I don’t think I’ve even opened Signal in nearly six months even though I’d much rather use it than the default messenger.
Sadly, I think they saw the writing on the wall with Google’s RCS push, and the decided lack of RCS APIs for Android apps to implement an RCS interface outside of Google. SMS has a lot of staying power, so it won’t happen overnight. But there’s a good chance that third-party RCS apps on Android will never be a real thing, or will forever end up hobbled. I think the Signal product folks imagined they had a LOT more clout than they actually had in the community. Sort of a less disastrous version of the Twitter and Reddit changes this year, trying to lock folks in.
Still fascinates me how many folks in the US use SMS. It’s been dead for over a decade now over here. I mean I would have expected it to stay with a lot of folks using feature phones. But that also not the case as far as I know.
Because it’s a universal standard. It doesn’t matter if they have an android, and apple, a microsoft phone, some LG flip phone- SMS Just Works.
And the fact that Signal has dropped support for it is why Signal no longer works and has lost basically it’s entire US/European market, because it’s now just another walled garden that needs people to get people- and it doesn’t have the people.
I thought most parts of Europe are the ones that dropped SMS
I only communicate with two people in signal. I still use it because I genuinely despise Android messenger.
2 people, one of which is your relative and the other drug dealer I imagine
Downvoted but the only people I know who used signal were drug dealers/users
Cuz, it was about killing functionality in order to grow their market share. Just go listen to the new lame ass Signal CEO. It’s capitalism that ruined Signal like it does everything
What are you talking about? Where did they say that? How does capitalism ruin a non-profit organization? It makes absolute sense for them to have removed SMS. Here’s their statement about the removal: https://www.signal.org/blog/sms-removal-android/
This was always the hardest part of these types of apps for me… getting people who just want something to work and already have a working thing are pretty impossible to get to swtich
Yup, I used Signal for years, it was my standard “messager” for everyone, people with Signal too or regular SMS. since they dropped SMS, I dropped Signal…
I removed it immediately because of this. It’s inconvenient to try and remember who I can communicate with through signal, and who I have to use a different app for. Signal jumped the shark.
Yupp. Had been working for a while on getting people to Signal, and then they dropped SMS, and they moved to other things and i couldn’t realy recommend it anymore.
Not only that, it makes people less likely to move to something new. I had almost everyone moved to signal. Now there’s one left, because it doesn’t work for SMS. Great choice they made. I haven’t even been able to convince one of my contacts to install simplex, and I doubt I’ll ever be able to. I had one shot, and wasted it on signal. I’m kind of salty.
Yeah this same thing happened to me. I rarely get messages in signal anymore and can’t reliably know who still has it installed. It’s great for folks you are in regular communication with though.
I made it easy by making it the only messenger I use. Sure, you can send me a sms, but that’s not gonna work for pictures and especially videos.
I’m very glad they did. It was hard to recommend while they did, it’s a huge security risk! Sms needs to die
Signal frustrates me, because Signal Foundation is clueless on what people actually want and it just feels like their product direction is so baffling it somehow turned into another failed Google messaging app without being a Google product(they even hired a former Google exec to run Signal!) I’ve never touched their crypto or stories, and I thought the SMS support removal makes zero sense and their justification is flimsy at best, it gave me Hangouts flashbacks.
The main problem with removing SMS support isn’t that I can’t convince my friends and family to switch any more(though very annoying), it’s that since Signal has marketed itself as a highly private messaging app, it now has a certain reputation of being used for… particular things. Without SMS support, even having Signal installed on your phone looks suspicious, since you can’t say that you’re using it as a nicer SMS app anymore.
I’ve used it for years and somehow had no clue they even had sms support. Doesn’t really matter to me because SMS is wildly unreliable for the location I’m at anyway. I’d rather use the actual app if still given the choice. I can understand the move to drop support for it, to be honest.
I can infer what you mean by “particular things”, but I’ve never really heard of that amongst anyone I know. Many people think that of whatsapp, too.
Is there any alternatives out there that support SMS and RCS as well? I would love to just have an all in one app.
Likewise, I uninstalled as soon as they made the baffling decision to remove SMS. It became yet another competing messaging service.
I have been disappointed by Signal a lot.
- They tie themselves very closely with Google services, to the point that they refuse to be on FDroid by design
- There was a long period when they stopped publishing server side code when they were bashing others like Telegram for not open sourcing their server side code
- Their Linux desktop client is absolutely horrible.
They tie themselves very closely with Google services, to the point that they refuse to be on FDroid by design
While they do push the Play Store version, they also have an APK, and my understanding is that it does not rely on Google Play Services, though it might be buggier without them. If I recall correctly, the origin of Signal not being on F-Droid was related to the building and signature model that F-Droid used (builds by F-Droid, then signed by F-Droid’s keys), as mentioned in, eg, this issue. With that said, it has been pointed out that there are alternatives, like a separate repository, than, eg, the Guardian Project uses, and F-Droid apparently does now have a process for developer-signed apks.
Their general hostility toward outside developers and forks, however, and that the awkward server side code availability seemed to be related to the brazenly problematic cryptocoin advertisement, are extremely disappointing, however.
Just to confirm what you said, I used Signal on LineageOS for over 6 months with no Google Play Services (installed through Aurora Store) – definitely doesn’t rely on them.
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All fair complaints. I’ve managed to switch over all of my contacts to Signal (that I care to talk to, at least).
My biggest gripe is no back up support on iOS, meaning that if I lose my phone I lose everything. People have tried hand waving it away as a privacy feature, but I think backing up messages is a bare minimum for a messaging app - especially with the released of Advanced Data Protection for iCloud.
The worst part of using Signal is to try and convince all your friends/family to use Signal. Otherwise it’s a pretty great messaging app. You can’t edit messages once they’re sent, but other than that it’s pretty great.
I used to donate to Signal, and they made the stupidest fucking decision I’ve ever seen.
You used to be able to use signal (at least on Android) as your default messenger app, sending encrypted Signals to other users, or SMS to non-signal users. Have a normie family member who doesn’t know about computers? Easy, set it & forget it.
Now? They removed that functionality, so it only works for other signal users. Someone else had a good metaphor: imagine if http and https needed different web browsers & you couldn’t see one on the other. How well do you think https uptake would have been?
So fucking stupid.
Lmao WHAT? They seriously did this? Yeah say goodbye to having my boomer parents understand anything else other than what’s loaded on their shitty $50 android phone they got for free from their shitty CDMA provider…
I hear you, but, SMS is the farthest from secure you can get - so I can see why they chose not to support it.
A really secure messaging system is worthless if it’s not used. SMS too insecure? Ok, change the UI to reflect that. Have an open lock symbol or eye. Notification reminders that it’s insecure & nudge to invite your friend to Signal.
Boomer parents using Signal & now it doesn’t support SMS? Congrats, now the app doesn’t work to message the majority of their contacts. The average user isn’t going to check if someone’s on signal, send them an invite, then wait to message until they get the app. They’ll just move to their (Android) default message app that literally works with all US phones. Congrats, now less signal users, gj .
I think that might be a narrow view though. Most of the world likely doesn’t use SMS anymore (for probably a decade). So removing SMS didn’t make much of a difference there, but increased security. Especially when people are used to use multiple apps anyways.
So the better analogy would be “imagine if gopher and http needed separate browsers”. Except they do.
Most of the world likely doesn’t use SMS anymore
Wow, so I guess all the countries in the world that DO still use it primarily, including the US, most of Europe, canada, etc, can go screw themselves?
Nobody wins when you try to gatekeep security. Stop doing that.
German here. Nobody ever uses SMS, literally nobody. They are only used for 2fa.
I’m aware of few people who use SMS in Europe, and very few people who use it as their primary means of texting; I’ve even seen people outright ask that they not be sent SMSs. WhatsApp is almost ubiquitous, and it often feels like it’s assumed everyone has it, even if they don’t use it as their primary texting method.
It does seem very common in the US, however.
Yeah. That’s my experience as well. I will also ask people to stop sending me SMS. The last time that happened was probably over 10 years ago though. Everyone I ever met (except for US folks) uses messengers nowadays. I mean even a lot of US folks use iMessage instead of SMS. Even though that’s weird as well. Since I would expect folks to use some universal app that isn’t restricted to a specific phone brand.
Most of the world likely doesn’t use SMS anymore
That has not been the case from what I’ve seen (I’m Australian). The only widespread methods of communication I see are SMS and iMessage. Things like Discord and Instagram are only used among younger people.
Edit: Actually people do use Facebook messenger. Don’t know how many though
i miss SMS, makes it easy to sneak in a change. swap them to signal, where they do their SMS, and as people become signalified, then they start sending them signals. It was such a market creator for little cost.
Oh well.
50% of the US uses Android. All android phones can text each other & iPhones by default via SMS in the US. The United States is 300 million people, and also the literal home of the Signal Foundation.
You’re right, that is a good analogy. Https used the same browser as http, and now https is widespread. Gopher needs a whole separate browser. It’s niche. Good security only works if people actually use it.
The US is a weird place. Feels like such a modern country but then they use technology from the last century and no one seems to question that …
But you CAN delete messages for after they are sent if the chat is set up that way. You can also set chats up so that messages can’t deleted. Or so that all messages expire and disappear after a period of time.
What about Matrix? Much better, IMO
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I personally prefer apps on the matrix network! Www.Matrix.org has a list of client apps, but I’ve found Element is great on windows, steam deck, and android! Call quality and chat stability can get weird sometimes, but overall it’s very very secure and pretty feature rich! 🙂
From the little bit I researched, it’s kinda similar in the way that the fediverse works! It’s decentralized, and one account works everywhere. Good stuff!
If it’s decentralised, hosted by various unknown parties that can tamper with it as much as they like without thorough oversight, how can it be considered very secure? This is what worries me.
Well you still choose the instance your on. Don’t use one from an uknown party. If you can, just host it yourself, it’s not very demanding. But I find signal to be much simpler to introduce to your parents for example, just because it’s like Whatsapp and just works.
Is this an ad? It feels like an ad.
Anyway I much prefer Signal but thanks to boomer co-workers I’m still also forced to use Whatsapp.
It’s an ad and it’s not even subtle about it.
This isn’t an ad, I wasn’t paid for this post. Just to clear the air: fuck facebook, fuck elon musk and twitter, fuck anyone who thinks this is a paid advertisement. I wish I was paid for this shit, I just wanted to spread the word. Thank you. 😀 👍
Isn’t Whatsapp encrypted end to end?
Facebook owns it.
That doesn’t bother me as long as the messages are encrypted end to end.
“WhatsApp privacy policy is terrible for user privacy,” says Ashley Simmons, founder of avoidthehack!, a website that promotes online privacy and security awareness. “It requires data sharing with Facebook, doesn’t offer encryption for chat backups, and ‘mines’ the metadata of your messages.”
It does matter who’s telling you that you’re safe trusting them.
I hear what you’re saying and I’m not trying to promote Whatsapp, but want to note that backups do offer encryption. They did not use to and I believe it is off by default, however.
I hear your point as well. I just innately don’t trust Facebook. I can’t help but feel like, while they put out a public idea of their work, there is very much some secret shit they keep hidden, and it’s all the worst shit you can expect from someone with their hands on the data and power they have their hands on.
Personal choices. I can’t trust FB. Although, I don’t live in Europe or South America, so I have the option to avoid WhatsApp. When I lived in both of those other places, WhatsApp was basically texting because it was free, whereas actual texting is expensive (maybe that’s changed, but WhatsApp is ubiquitous in other countries unlike it is in the US).
I wish they hadn’t gotten rid of SMS though, that was the biggest sell for me over other options. I’m never going to get more than 2 or 3 people I regularly text to switch…
Here in the Netherlands no one uses SMS, purely Whatsapp. So removing this functionality, though often complained about by people presumably from the US, did not hurt functionality at all here. I also like the features like Stories, it’s a direct competition with Instagram/Snapchat, though just like Whatsapp Stories, barely anyone will use it.
Yes I am in the US and I understand that this is a US centric problem though SMS is the feature that set signal apart from other secure messaging apps and made it slightly easier to get people to join. It was a nice alternative to imessage on android as opposed to yet another messaging app. Even in the US I have had to use SMS, WhatsApp, fb messenger, instagram’s DMs, Line, Group me, Matrix, etc, to talk to different people and I was not going to convince many to switch to signal (I tried).
i too miss this. capture the messaging market, and keep the stock SMS function!
With this move, i am more keen to see matrix make it to the big leagues.
Question though? Why did they get rid of sms functionality?
Because they turned away from the original founder’s philosophy, which is that ‘perfect security’ is a pie-in-the-sky novelty that isn’t actually useful to anyone, and what’s actually important is security that people actually use. Even if it’s slightly less secure, it’s still a net positive because people are actually using it.
When he left, a google CEO took over and frankly it’s just been one terrible decision after another- cryptocurrencies, ‘stories’, stickers, removal of SMS, all kinds of stupid shit that drove people away.
I used to have nearly 50 people on my signal contacts list. Now there are 3.
Yes lol same. And because of the verification code that needs to be typed in every so often, my messages never reach them. I have to text them, “hey go to signal”, and then it finally goes through.
Fun fact: on Android after not using an app for more than three months (the exact time can vary by manufacturer) the OS will remove permissions including notifications (suppressing the app’s ability to run in the background) to save battery. So the app will literally stop working.
For a seldom used app like Signal that’s hurt from a lack network effect, this triggers a death spiral outside of the privacy enthusiast community. When it had SMS support this guaranteed some usage, but now that’s gone.
It has its downsides as well. Though better than WhatsApp and telegram obviously
I have to say that some of the points on that site are outright ridiculous.
First off, they quote the privacy officer of the German protestant church, who has no technical background according to his own bio:
"… when using Signal, data protection concerns remain, especially because this service processes personal data of its users outside the scope of the GDPR. The use of this messenger service can therefore not be recommended.”
Not sure what that’s supposed to mean, because the GDPR applies based on user location and not company location. Although I’m going to grant that having servers in US jurisdictions may be a concern.
And he goes on to say that Threema (for profit, proprietary server code and (at the time) client code) and SIMSme (for profit, fully proprietary) are preferable over Signal because of the jurisdictions they’re in. Not sure about anyone else, but I’m going to trust the open source software more, regardless of what jurisdiction the servers are in.
I do have to give him credit for recognising a “self-hosted messenger service based on established and freely available protocols on federated servers” as the best option, though.
negative: actual server software used does not have to match the version published on GitHub
Fair, but how many other messaging services publish server code at all?
negative: terms of use (external) as well as privacy policy in English only
I suspect there’s very little overlap in the Venn diagram of people who use (or even know of) Signal and people who don’t speak English.
negative: weaknesses in authentication for encryption
This boils down to users trusting Signal as a certificate authority and not verifying their contacts “security number”. Fair point, but a user can still choose to use Signal in a way that removes those weaknesses.
Of course, since we’re on a federated service, I expect people to jump on the chance to recommend Matrix/XMPP instead, but realistically, I’ve had much more success getting people to use Signal. And apart from federated messengers, I’m not aware of anything better than Signal.
The GDPR applies to companies looking to utilise the software. So the church or any other entity bound by the GDPR cannot use the software due to it’s closed structure with servers in the US. This is absolutely a concern since business is conducted over messenge apps nowadays. I must’ve broken GDPR when communicating with my students about tutoring over WhatsApp. Our midwife must insist on threema with no alternatives. For the church this means they cannot communicate amongst themselves over Signal.
The site has a German audience in mind so the fact that the privacy policy not being accessible to non-English speakers is an obvious concern. I don’t understand how “well only few non English speakers use it” is an excuse.
And lastly the fact that Signal is the only CA means that they can use a machine- in-the-middle attack on their own users and there is no way to protect against it.
And lastly the fact that Signal is the only CA means that they can use a machine- in-the-middle attack on their own users and there is no way to protect against it.
As I mentioned in my comment, it doesn’t - if the users verify each other’s “security number”.
The theory fails once it meets reality.
https://eprints.cs.univie.ac.at/4799/
All the other points stand as well.
I do not like the fact that Signal requires a phone number to be used. If I want to talk to someone on Signal, I need to give him my Signal registered phone number. I do not understand why can’t they introduce User name like Telegram so we do not have to reveal our phone number to others.
Telegram requires a phone number too. So I don’t understand your point.
It does not require to share it with other people tho. Still as far as I know they save it on their servers. Signal tries to not save any metadata at all. That’s great.
In my opinion, Signal isn’t trying to be a Matrix alternative. Anonymity between users isn’t their objective, they mostly want to be a none profit alternative to WhatsApp, Messenger, etc… with strong E2E encryption. Phone numbers is ultimately the best way to discover new users as soon as you install the app.
My problem with Signal is that nobody I know uses it, which unfortunately makes it useless.
Other than that, I genuinely think it’s pretty great. But you’ll have to persuade people to leave Facebook and WhatsApp en masse before it becomes ubiquitous enough to be useful.
Funny how things can be different. In my circle everybody uses it, even my mom. We’ve also had a very active group chat with my friends for many years in Signal.
How did that happen? Have you all used Signal from the beginning or did you switch over from something else
My friends appreciate privacy. Everybody knows Meta is shit, and so are the other American big corporations. My mom likes to talk with me and Signal is not a problem for her, if I reply to her messages from that channel in a few minutes anyhow. Our friend chat also has one week period until the messages are deleted for good. You can talk more freely about everyday things.
Tried to switch to signal. But it’s useless without everyone i know switching over from Whatsapp. Which is like merged with our country at this point.
Yeah I really wanted to switch to Signal from Whatsapp but people don’t want to try new messaging apps. Nowadays I use telegram but it’s just bots and 2 or 3 friends.
Welcome to life after 40 - I’ve been an early adopter all my life, but my network hasn’t moved with me.
As a result joining Snapchat has no value for me.
So I tend to use apps that are friend-agnostic like this and TIkTok.
Side note: my fave messaging app is Confide, it only reveals redacted words as you run your finger over them, and then deletes. So it’s impossible to screenshot.
It sounds like you’d still be able to take a video of it, then do a little bit of filtering and you’d have an image of the whole message. It’d take slightly more effort, but it’s not “impossible to screenshot.”
It’s not really that tall of an ask to install one more app - especially one that asks for nothing, you’re not taking away anything, you’re adding.
People are weird.
I don’t know. People can’t keep up with everything (like tech privacy news) in life and now out of their 100+ contacts this one person wants them to switch to this different app that nobody else seems to be using.
From their perspective it’s kinda pointless
I just wasn’t budging. Refused to use WhatsApp and texted people instead. Slowly a lot of my friends switched and realised signal is better in every way. Even my parents find it the best as it is the easiest for them to use.
Yeah not going to happen for me unfortunately
Or just use Matrix/Element. No phone number needed, plus federation!
The disadvantage of matrix is that a lot of metadata is generated. Good architecture in terms of idea, but unfortunately no privacy messaging.
Depends on the use case. For one on one messaging or small group chats, Signal is great! If you need a Slack/Discord replacement, Matrix is your go to.
Matrix isn’t really as smooth. Once Revolt gets a good android client then I’ll move my group chats to there
When’s the last time you used Matrix? Its definitely smooth nowadays.
Hmmm… Looks good! I’ll keep an eye on it.
Wait, there doesn’t seem to be any encryption in Revolt. 🤔
Looks like it’s in the plans, by default. All good.
@Cevilia @TendieMaster69 XMPP > Matrix. Proper IETF internet standard, less bloat and not dependent on venture capital funding.
The main problem with XMPP is that there is literally no clients with good UI.
