Why I, And You Should, Use Signal Messaging App
Stop using Facebook Messenger (owned by Meta). Stop using WhatsApp (owned by Meta). Stop using Telegram (owned by someone). Stop using whatever Google is currently calling their messaging app (owned by, well you get the idea)
Use Signal (to quote the CEO of Twitter, I know!)
Yeah yeah Mike, yeah, BUT WHY?
Privacy and security: using Signal means that your messages that you don't need, let alone want, others reading are secure & private. Not just the actual message but also that you're sending X to Y at a specified time on Monday evening.
Signal, the app and the organisation knows nothing about you or your messages. It stores nothing at all.
At the level of the technology, Signal messages are encrypted end-to-end. This is similar to WhatsApp, which uses the Signal Protocol to encrypt many WhatsApp messages. But unlike WhatsApp and others, Signal goes way beyond this. We encrypt metadata as well, so we don’t know who you are, we don’t know your name or profile information, and we don’t know which groups you’re in or who’s talking to whom. Metadata is very important and revealing. All other platforms currently collect it, and potentially join it with other data sources they have access to (looking at you, Facebook), or hand it over to law enforcement.
What does that mean, try this analogy:
... say law enforcement goes to the headquarters of a company that produces pens. They bring a specific pen to the company, and they ask the company to tell them everything that’s ever been written with that specific pen. Of course the company would look at them like WTF. That’s not how pens work, we can’t tell you that! Everyone would get that, understand it, and let law enforcement go on their way.
Yeah, whatever, everyone starts with great principles but then dollars come a knocking, looking at you WhatsApp.
Signal is a nonprofit. This structure is a first line of defense to ensure that we’re laser-focused on providing people with a truly private way to communicate. We don’t have shareholders or equity, so we’re not being pushed to prioritize profits and growth over our core mission. There’s no billion-dollar exit coming for executives, so even if I turned into a terrible person tomorrow and decided to sell Signal to a private equity firm, I wouldn’t get anything out of it. This is in contrast to WhatsApp, which is owned and underwritten by Facebook. So that’s already a world of difference in terms of the incentive models and the pressures that could be applied to loosen privacy and encryption.
Your stuff is not just safe, it's yours, no-one can get it even if someone wanted to, not even Signal themselves. Bad people, any people will need physical access to your phone - don't give them your phone.
So use Signal, it's the system the spooks and reporters all around the world use, and there's a reason for that.
NOOOOOO!
My mates, my family, are all on Facebook - grow up, you're better than that.
BUUUUUUT!
I don't care with other's knowing my messages or when I send something to my kids. Really, cool, post them publicly and we can all have a read coz they are being read, you just don't know it.
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