• istanbullu@lemmy.ml
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    4 months ago

    Signal’s hostility to third party clients is a huge red flag.

    They also refuse to distance themselves from Google’s app store.

    • ᗪᗩᗰᑎ@lemmy.ml
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      4 months ago

      That’s outdated information:

      Go forth and contribute, fork, or create your own.

      They also refuse to distance themselves from Google’s app store.

      This link has existed forever at this point if we count in internet years: https://signal.org/android/apk/ - getting an app directly from the developer with no middleman is about as distant as you can get from Google’s app store.

      • istanbullu@lemmy.ml
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        4 months ago

        Those clients exist despite Signal Foundation, not because they encourage community development. They are doing everything they can to discourage third party app development.

      • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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        4 months ago

        I wish they had Signal on F-droid but at the end of the day at least it is possible to use Molly Foss.

      • misaloun@reddthat.com
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        4 months ago

        Signal actually has a rule on not using third party clients on its servers. These clients existing do not prove the point you intend.

    • Vitaly@feddit.uk
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      4 months ago

      Yeah, I would like to use it from f-droid instead of google store or apk

    • ramenu@lemmy.ml
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      4 months ago

      What? How is this a red flag? Having third party clients is not good for security.

      • doctortran@lemm.ee
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        4 months ago

        Having third party clients is not good for security.

        If the first party provider told you this, you should always second guess them.

        Moreover, providing an option that informed users can choose doesn’t hurt security. This idea the user can’t be trusted to use the appropriate type of messaging if provided options needs to die.

        • ramenu@lemmy.ml
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          4 months ago

          When you use a client, you are relying on the client’s crypto implementation to be correct. This is only one part of it and there’s a lot more to it when it comes to hardening the program. Signal focuses on their desktop and mobile clients and they hire actual security professionals and cryptographers (unlike the charlatans in this thread) to implement it correctly.

          Having third party clients would not definitively mean the client is bad, but it most likely would break the security model. Just take a look at Matrix’s clients.

          • ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org
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            4 months ago

            When you use a client, you are relying on the client’s crypto implementation to be correct.

            Nothing prevents this other client from using the same as the original app. When the alt client is just a fork, it’s even easier to check if they kept it intact or not.

            This is only one part of it and there’s a lot more to it when it comes to hardening the program.

            Something at which even the original Signal fails. It has received criticism multiple times (1, 2) for not being verifiable whether it’s been tampered with by the app’s distributor, and also for having included properietary google services dependencies which dynamically load further code from the phone which is also a security issue. Worthy forks solve both of these.

            Signal focuses on their desktop and mobile clients and they hire actual security professionals and cryptographers (unlike the charlatans in this thread) to implement it correctly.

            Last I heard (a month or so ago) the desktop client had serious unfixed issues.


            I think it further erodes your point that Signal is not just hostile in terms of not wanting it, but Moxie for instance has been very, very verbal about this.

            • ramenu@lemmy.ml
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              4 months ago

              Something at which even the original Signal fails. It has received criticism multiple times (1, 2) for not being verifiable whether it’s been tampered with by the app’s distributor, and also for having included properietary google services dependencies which dynamically load further code from the phone which is also a security issue. Worthy forks solve both of these.

              That’s unfortunate. I do hope that these forks don’t go and start making extensive changes though, because that’s where it becomes a problem.

          • poVoq@slrpnk.net
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            4 months ago

            No, if your system can’t support 3rd party clients properly, it is inherently insecure, especially in an e2ee context where you supposedly don’t have to trust the server/vendor. If a system claims to be e2ee, but tightly controls both clients and servers (for example WhatsApp), that means they can rug-pull that e2ee at any point in time and even selectively target people with custom updates to break that e2ee for them only. The only way to realistically protect yourself from that is using a 3rd party client (and yes, I know, in case of Signal also theoretically reviewing every code change and using reproducible builds, but that’s not very realistic).

            Now admittedly, Signal has started to be less hostile to 3rd party clients like Molly, so it’s not as bad anymore as it used to be.

          • UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml
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            4 months ago

            Appreciate the link. I still believe in Matrix, even if the client ecosystem isn’t there yet. There HAS to be something to replace discord, the enshitification has already begun.

            • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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              4 months ago

              I wouldn’t call it a discord alternative. It is closer to fancy IRC/live forms.

              Then again I don’t really use Discord

          • ahal@lemmy.ca
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            4 months ago

            Excellent point! If I’m sending someone information that could get me killed if it were intercepted by the state, I’d sure as hell want some guarantees about how the other side is handling my data. Disallowing third party clients gives me at least one such guarantee.

            • doctortran@lemm.ee
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              4 months ago

              You have absolutely zero guarantees, with or without their policy on third party apps. You can not send sensitive information to someone else’s phone and tell yourself it couldn’t possibly have been intercepted, or that someone couldn’t get ahold of that phone, or that the person you’re sending it to won’t take a screenshot and save it to their cloud.

              A lot of software nowadays is doing a real disservice to their users by continuing to lie to them like this by selling them the notion that they can control their information after it has been sent. It’s really making people forget basic information hygiene. No app can guarantee that message won’t be intercepted or mishandled. They can only give you tools to hopefully prevent that, but there are no guarantees.

              Moreover, this policy does not exclude them from including third-party functionality and warning the user when they are communicating with somebody that isn’t using encryption.

              Too many of these apps and services are getting away with the “security” excuse for what is effectively just creating a walled garden to lock users in. Ask yourself how you can get your own data out of these services when you decide to quit them, and it becomes more apparent what they’re doing.

              • rottingleaf@lemmy.world
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                4 months ago

                A lot of software nowadays is doing a real disservice to their users by continuing to lie to them like this by selling them the notion that they can control their information after it has been sent. It’s really making people forget basic information hygiene. No app can guarantee that message won’t be intercepted or mishandled. They can only give you tools to hopefully prevent that, but there are no guarantees.

                Oh, yes. These “deleted messages”, or these “hidden likes”, or whatever else.

                I mean, there are fundamental things and algorithms allowing to create such a system, with blinded keys, ghost keys and what not, only these disgusting cheats have a centralized service where any employee can see everything, yet pretend that they have “a security feature”.

              • ahal@lemmy.ca
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                4 months ago

                Of course, I fully agree! My point was just that you can eliminate the risk of poorly implemented cryptography at the endpoints. Obviously there’s a thousand and one other ways things could go wrong. But we do the best we can with security.

                Anyway apparently third party clients are allowed after all? So it’s a moot point.

              • ahal@lemmy.ca
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                4 months ago

                You do if third party clients aren’t possible? You have control over what client the receiving end is using.

                But apparently third party clients are possible, so it’s moot.

          • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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            4 months ago

            Signal third party clients base off the Signal code base. They just add patches and remove certain dependencies. Also they are often more secure. You logic is from the Apple PR department.

            • ramenu@lemmy.ml
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              4 months ago

              Again, having third party clients would not definitively mean the client is bad. Obviously, if it’s a simple fork with hopefully small patches that are just UI changes, it’s probably not going to harm the security model.

              I should have phrased this better in my original post. When I was thinking about third party clients, Matrix and XMPP immediately came to my mind. Not very simple forks. So I’ll phrase this better: “Having non-trivial third party clients is not good for security.” What non-trivial means is left to interpretation though, I suppose.

      • PlexSheep@infosec.pub
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        4 months ago

        Why do you think so? I see it as a strength in diversity and a great driving force for a proper server api

    • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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      4 months ago

      Do you hate Signal or do you hate the west? There legitimate reasons to not like Signal but calling them hostile toward third party clients is untrue. Last time I checked Signal wasn’t proprietary.

      • jet@hackertalks.com
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        4 months ago

        They have demonstrated history of asking third party clients to not use the signal name, and not use the signal network. The client that currently exists that do this do it against the wishes of the signal foundation

        • ᗪᗩᗰᑎ@lemmy.ml
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          4 months ago

          They have demonstrated history of asking third party clients to not use the signal name, and not use the signal network.

          The lead developer, nearly 10 years ago now, specifically asked LibreSignal to stop. A single event does not make a demonstrated history.

          The client that currently exists that do this do it against the wishes of the signal foundation

          If you have evidence to back this claim, I would like to see it so I can stop spreading misinformation.

          • jet@hackertalks.com
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            4 months ago

            In the Libra signal issue that you linked to, they made it clear they don’t want third-party clients talking to signal servers

            You’re free to use our source code for whatever you would like under the terms of the license, but you’re not entitled to use our name or the service that we run.

            If you think running servers is difficult and expensive (you’re right), ask yourself why you feel entitled for us to run them for your product.

            • ᗪᗩᗰᑎ@lemmy.ml
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              4 months ago

              He was specifically talking to that developer. The “You” and “You’re” in that quote was specifically targeted at the LibreSignal developer.

              I recall the gurk-rs developer specifically mentioned that his client reports to Signal’s servers as a non-official app. The Signal admins can see the client name and version - just like websites can tell what browser you’re using - and could easily block third party clients if they wanted to but they don’t.

              If Signal wanted to block third party clients, they would have blocked them already.

              • jet@hackertalks.com
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                4 months ago

                Moxie made it incredibly clear, he does not want third party is talking to the signal servers.

                Libra signal took him at his word and turn themselves off

                The other developers, like Molly, take a stronger road.

                Is signal currently banning third party clients? No. But they’ve made it clear they don’t like them. They didn’t actually ban Libra signal, they just asked them to stop. Could they ban the clients in the future? Yes

                • ᗪᗩᗰᑎ@lemmy.ml
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                  4 months ago

                  I’ll reiterate my statement as you didn’t address it.

                  If Signal wanted to block third party clients, they would have blocked them already.

                  • jet@hackertalks.com
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                    4 months ago

                    I respectfully disagree. They could be waiting until it becomes a big issue. Right now that would just cost them good PR, but if somebody was using the signal network and their client became very popular they absolutely have expressed the desire, intent, and as you indicated the capability to do so.

                • istanbullu@lemmy.ml
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                  4 months ago

                  If you have a backdoored client, then you would naturally object to third party clients :)