All communication in #signal goes through these tech giants: Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Cloudflare
Just texting goes through Amazon.
Group chat will also go through Google.
...
#GAFAM is toxic to free software, supports mass surveillance and a lot other very bad things. Supporting such companies means also supporting their culture and their dominance. It's never just about the privacy of a single person.
@raimondaslapinskas @briar Briar doesn't need 100 million users to be successful IMO. I don't think it will ever be as popular as Signal, but it doesn't need to be. Signal is aiming at everyday use for normal people with the widest adoption possible. If your threat model includes shutdown of the entire Internet and/or natural disasters that destroy infrastructure, Briar would be great.
@raimondaslapinskas @briar Internet shutdowns are not hypothetical threats. That literally just happened in Uganda a few days ago.
@raimondaslapinskas @briar What makes you think the UK government would never shut down the Internet?
@briar
So, are any of the major message apps safe then?
@briar but it’s E2EE soooo.....
@silmathoron @kev
(just to not cause confusion
This is an unofficial account run by a briar supporter. Me @syster
If you ever think "meh, briar" because of something you read here, you should probably think instead "meh, syster."
@silmathoron @kev @syster
I'll try to avoid such posts in future, but I also believe it's important to raise awareness about the importance of having the possibility to control infrastructure.
If you can't you're forced to go with what ever the leader choose. Signal is a nice messenger. Still it forces you to use the infrastructure the leader choose.
@silmathoron @kev @syster
It can be encrypted as much as something can be, what won't change by that:
- metadata will include ip and time.
- financial support for GAFAM
- marketing of GAFAM like: "if even this super secure chat is hosted at GAFAM, then GAFAM can't be too bad
Briar does not support GAFAM. Briar hides real IP over internet connection.
(this is not a statement to not use Signal, but to be critical)
@silmathoron @kev @syster
Yes. I agree.
@briar just to play devil's advocate here, one could argue that by using tried and tested infrastructure, like that of GAFAM, Signal are ensuring that their service remains as stable as possible, yet as private as possible given the controls that are in place.
What reassurances to we have that Briar is of the same ilk in terms of infrastructure and stability?
@silmathoron @kev @briar
yes. bottleneck of Briar would be the Tor network since internet traffic is routed through it.
I don't see Tor going down, because of a chat.
@silmathoron I have no idea.
@kev @briar @silmathoron
> ...like that of GAFAM, Signal are ensuring that their service remains as stable as possible,..
That's the sort of hidden marketing I mentioned, that #signal is (unintentionally) doing to #GAFAM.
It's one of the reason I dislike signal's decision, not a reason why I endorse their decision.
I use email for example. Since I'm using email, it was never down. Not a single time, even so it has much more user then signal.
@briar haha, noted ^^
thanks!
@briar What server network are they supposed to use with such quantities of users? Sure federation would technically work but signals goal is to be easy and painless to use for everyone.
Traffic is encrypted anyway so it really doesnt matter.