Signal is an end-to-end encrypted messenger app forsmartphones that has been recommended by the likes of Edward Snowden and hasseen an especially large influx of new users in recent months who are suddenlymore concerned about Facebook or other tech companies reading or censoringtheir chat messages.
It's a fairly good app for what it does and it would probably fit the needs ofyour "average user" very well, but it doesn't work well for my needs and I stilluse Telegram in its place.
Now, I would like to use Signal instead of Telegram, because Signal's technologyis more sound and the chats are truly end-to-end encrypted (where Signal Co.would be incapable of reading my chats even if they wanted to). Telegram incomparison uses some home-made cryptography (and you shouldnever roll your own crypto)and their chats are not end-to-end encrypted by default, but Telegram does havesome good quality-of-life usability features that makes it more appealing to methan Signal for now.
Signal as compared to Telegram
Both Signal and Telegram are "smartphone first" messengers and they base youruser account around your cell phone number. Signing up for either messenger isas simple as receiving an SMS text message with a verification code, and you'regood to go.
Signal is 100% end-to-end encrypted which means the company running theservers can't access your chat messages, but it also means that your encryptionkeys for your chats need to be handled specially. With Signal:
- There is a "primary app" (Signal on your Android or iOS device) which is whereyou registered your account, and then you can link one or more "secondary apps"such as Signal Desktop to chat with your contacts from your PC.
- Signal Desktop (secondary apps) pairs with your primary app and uses it as a"proxy" to get on Signal's network. That is: if I power down my Android phone,then Signal Desktop stops working because only my Android has the encryptionkeys for my chat messages.
- If you lose your phone, or buy a new phone, or reinstall your Android OS orsuch: re-registering your Signal account means all your old chats are lost andyou roll new encryption keys and all your chat contacts are informed that yourkeys have changed (which may be useful info to them in case your Signal accountwere taken over by an attacker). Only ONE primary Signal app can be registeredat a time for your cell phone number.
Telegram on the other hand trades the strong E2E encryption for a more traditionalclient/server model:
- Any device can create a Telegram account for your cell number. I created mineusing the Telegram Desktop app, and later logged into it on Android and on myPinephone. No matter which device was logging in, all my old chats were accessibleon the cloud.
- Telegram does have optional E2E encryption called "Secret Chats" but these donot sync between devices. It seems most of my "Secret Chats" have bound themselvesto my Android device and I can't see these on Desktop or on Pinephone.
Problems with Signal
The first problem is that Signal IDs are the same as my cell phone number. If Iwanted to chat with a rando from the Internet over Signal, I have to give them mycell number which is personal information that they shouldn't have.
Telegram uses cell numbers too, but you can also create a username to sharewith rando's so they can chat with you without knowing your phone number.
Signal reportedly is working on a username system, too, but it's not there justyet.
The other problem is the "master app on Android/companion app on Desktop" modelthat Signal has.
Android and Pinephone
I'm looking at the Pinephone to be my new daily driver overmy older Android phone. The Pinephone runs mainline GNU/Linux software and doesn'tyet have an official Signal app available for it.
The Axolotl app on Linuxlooks like the best contender in that space: it can serve as a "primary" Signalapp and register your account. But, doing so would de-register Signal on Androidand I can't have Signal in both places at the same time. At least with TelegramI can be signed in on both Android and Pinephone together.
Ideally I would use neither Signal nor Telegram
Signal may be more secure/better than Telegram but really neither one of themis ideal. Signal is 100% open source, but in practice, it uses centralized serverscontrolled by Signal's company and they don't want third-party Signal client appsto use their servers. You can stand up your own Signal server, but that completelyisolates you from the greater Signal network -- it's not a federated protocol.
Telegram's client software is open source too, but uses the centralized serverscontrolled by Telegram and the server is not open source, and so it has similarproblems to Signal there.
The best solution would be to use an open standard like Matrixor the older XMPP: something where the servers are open source,the client apps are open source, and anybody can run their own server and the networkis federated and there is no need for a central company. XMPP is not end-to-endencrypted, though, and while Matrix supports that it's not "on by default" thereeither.
And either way: I'd have to convince my contacts to switch to Matrix which involvesthem finding a server they want to sign up on, which is somehow a much larger obstaclethan getting them to switch to Signal or Telegram or other "easy" centralizedmessenger.
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