Cross Platform Secure Messaging Apps

The Water Cooler
1

For Privacy, WhatsApp was to be avoided for years - I used it & still use it with a few people because some friends don’t see this as an issue. Now they claim they have E2EE but can we trust Mark Z. ? At least, they collect metadata or other information.

I used Signal for the past years but it has also some issues :

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Some days a go i heard and saw youtube video about MOLLY signal with better havent looked any deeper or anything so might be worth to look

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Signal does not encrypt at all by default…

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My understanding is that :

What dot you mean by does not encrypt at all by default ?

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I like Keybase; it does encrypted chats and has groups like Slack, but I mainly like the profile verification system and small private file storage. I used it on Windows, Android, iOS, and Linux (RPM installed as-is on Fedora)

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Thanks so sad they don’t provide an official Flatpak :

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I read recently that signal requires the user to enable encryption.
So its not encrypted by default, if that is true.

I do not use signal and have not verified if that is true.

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I do use Signal and have not had to enable encryption.

Here is Signal’s own position:

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Thanks for the link.
Beware : backup your Signal configuration/data. Apparently without a backup, with recent Flatpak version published, you’ll loose all your data/archives : v7.24.1 is Breaking database · Issue #7029 · signalapp/Signal-Desktop · GitHub

Pretty bad! :unamused:

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I lost interest in Signal back when they wanted to defend not having another option except Google’s GCM. They eventually caved and did Websocket, but I didn’t like their stance prior to that. I recall there being something odd about Signal not being on F-Droid too.

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What about Matrix protocol? While its primary usage is not direct chats, it can be used that way too.

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I only use Signal on my phone (with a daily backup). Hopefully the flatpak issue is fixed soon.

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Phone signal backups are local still so loose or destroy phone backups are gone

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My daily backup includes automated upload to a cloud service, and manual download to my laptop (from which I also take regular backups).

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I use Telegram, easy to install from RPM, auto-updates itself on launch. Allows large file transfers, and as an added bonus is even complying with recent law-enforcement efforts :slight_smile:
You do have to register an account on a E.164 enabled device first though, which is a bit outdated but it does work well all things considered.

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Molly is just a hardened fork of Signal’s Android app. Nothing different in how it works.

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If I need real privacy, I use Session (though I’ve only ever used it for one person, that was a special case.)