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VladVladikoff parent
$50 says this is some nation state trying to sow seeds of discord into the Signal user base. Signal is actually becoming so well adopted most of my friends are on it now. Trying to convince them all to use yet another app is going to be pretty tough, especially since there isn’t really any decent evidence that Signal is insecure.
toastal
Why should we be trusting this centralized service? I regret getting my family onto Signal as I would love to get there somewhere where we control our data & aren’t reliant on US-based service. When you look at the EU’s Chat Control law that’s trying to be pushed, the easiest target is going to be big, centralized services in jurisdictions friendly to the EU—it’s gonna be real hard doing this with a decentralized protocol. Signal deserves just as much criticism as any other thing operating out of California.
seanieb
- Signal is built in such a way that you do not need to trust the server. They’ve invented several novel encryption protocols beyond the messaging protocol that protects group membership and privacy.

- they’re open source and people like me regularly read parts of their code and in some cases use their code elsewhere. Also several undergraduates and PhD’s have written research papers on the signal protocol. It’s also the subject of a lot of security research (there was a good talk at defcon this year that found some minor privacy issues with signal notifications)

- no one has built a decentralized e2ee messaging app that’s actually secure and has privacy anything like the bar Signal sets. Matrix are getting close, they’ve recently made some encouraging changes, but it will take some time to verify.

- Moxie the founder of Signal gave a talk about the challenges of building something like signal in a decentralized environment - https://youtu.be/1W5fuqySBnE

- Signal is a nonprofit. They have stated repeatedly they will shutdown the app in regions or countries that make backdoors required by law.

mijoharas
Two questions:

* Do you know of anything better?

* Do you not trust the Signal Organisation? They've aren't able to subvert their encryption on the servers, and have publicly stated that they will leave a region before integrating client-side scanning. I for one believe them, since it's their raison d'être.

DANmode
Because they’re multi-region AWS!

/s

o999
It is a Signal client that uses same servers (i.e Users of Molly and Signal's official app can message and call each othera normally).
GuB-42
Signal has always seen some controversy, usually centered around centralization. Also the MOB cryptocurrency, the use of phone numbers, contact discovery,... It has led to the promotion of alternatives such as Matrix and third party applications such as Molly.

But these alternatives are all niches compared to Signal. Which is to say something considering that Signal itself is a niche compared to Whatsapp.

LtWorf
Let's not forget not releasing the server software for several years.
jeltz
If so they are certainly doing it ambitiously by fixing longstanding issues in Signal.

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