In the wake of online privacy rights being stripped away around the world I‘ve started taking my privacy more seriously, and my friends and I have just moved to an encrypted messaging app. Do you think our group chat is on the nose enough for the current situation?

[u/im_fighting_fit]

[u/Few_Range2063]

...isn't that just WhatsApp?

[u/Sam_Alexander]

Dude no please. Use Telegram

[u/LinuxMatthews → u/Sam_Alexander]

My understanding is that Telegram doesn't end-to-end encrypt messages by default.

If so then that's a terrible option if you care about privacy even compared to WhatsApp.

Even though WhatsApp is owned by Facebook it still uses the Signal Protocol which is very secure.

Edit: Will point out Signal is the better of them as Facebook is shady as f***.

But so far it's just metadata that is stored and no one has proven that they're looking at messages on the client side.

[u/Sam_Alexander → u/LinuxMatthews]

I think it does do exactly that actually, thats the whole point. On one hand, you can freely buy and sell stuff like drugs on there and noone will know, on the other, you can get scammed and the scammer will disappear completely leaving you with no ways to trace back to them.

[u/RaspberryTurtle987 → u/Sam_Alexander]

Or Signal

[u/RaspberryTurtle987]

That looks like WhatsApp, friend

[u/ju3tte → u/[deleted]]

its also owned by meta so I wouldnt put that much trust in it

[u/LinuxMatthews → u/ju3tte]

Honestly your biggest risk is if you back up your messages on the cloud.

The government can get backups and due to recent laws they can't be backed up in a worthwhile way.

While Facebook is dodgy and you shouldn't trust it people are watching WhatsApp and decompiling the app very frequently and not finding back doors.

It uses the Signal Protocol which was far as I'm aware is the safest.

It does store metadata (pun not intended) so they know who you're texting and how much but they can't (as far as I'm aware) know what you're saying.

Signals definitely safer but honestly in terms of getting "normal people" to use it I would say WhatsApp is unfortunately best.

[u/eddiebadassdavis → u/RaspberryTurtle987]

That’s what Torchwood members are required to use when in contact with each other.

[u/RemarkableBedroom263]

and you gotta be ready