Convincing people to use apps such as Signal is hard work and most can’t be convinced. But with those you manage to convince, do you feel happy to talk to them on Signal?
The problem is these people use Signal on Android/IOS which can’t be trusted and IOS has recently been in the news for having a backdoor. And it has also been revealed that american feds are able to read everyone’s push notifications and they do this as mass surveillance.
So not only do you have to convince people to use Signal which is an incredibly difficult challenge. You also have to convince them to go into settings to disable message and sender being included in the push notifications. And then there’s the big question is the Android and IOS operating systems are doing mass surveillance anyway. And many people find it taking a lot of effort to type on the phone so they install Signal on the computer which is a mac or Windows OS.
So I don’t think I feel comfortable sending messages in Signal but it’s better than Whatsapp.
These were some thoughts to get the discussion started and set the context.
Signal refuses to even try to accommodate for UnifiedPush or MQTT for those not using play services requiring an extra battery-draining socket to their servers. You are also still required to use one of the mobile duopoly OSs as a primary device to register (SIM still required). Good luck if you use a Linux phone, KaiOS, or just don’t want an ever-present tracking beacon on you. We all know the Electron-based desktop client is shit. I would flip this on its head & say it is the service’s probably if they choose to prioritize & mainly support the shitty mobile OS duopoly it’s their problem for providing a bad service & getting the criticism they deserve.
