I remember a time when visiting a website that opens a javacript dialog box asking for your name so the message “hi <name entered>” could be displayed was baulked at.

Why does signal want a phone number to register? Is there a better alternative?

  • pwalker@discuss.tchncs.de
    0·
    2 days ago

    The amount of trolls in this thread that either try to spew false information intentionally or just have no idea what they are talking about is insane.

    If you are worried about what data (including your phone number) law enforcement can recieve (if they have your specific user ID, which is not equal to your phone number) from the Signal company check this: https://propertyofthepeople.org/document-detail/?doc-id=21114562 Tldr: It’s the date of registration and last time user was seen online. No other information, Signal just doesn’t have any other and this is by design.

    If you want to know more about how they accomplish that feat you can check out the sealed sender feature: https://nerdschalk.com/what-is-sealed-sender-in-signal-and-should-you-enable-it/

    or the private contact discovery system: https://signal.org/blog/private-contact-discovery/

    Also as Signal only requires a valid phone number for registration you might try some of these methods (not sure if they still work): https://theintercept.com/2024/07/16/signal-app-privacy-phone-number/

    • Arthur Besse@lemmy.mlEnglish
      0·
      2 days ago

      False.

      edit: it’s funny how people downvoting comments about signal’s sealed sender being a farce never even attempt to explain what its threat model is supposed to be. (meaning: what attacks, with which adversary capabilities specifically, is it designed to prevent?)

        • Arthur Besse@lemmy.mlEnglish
          0·
          2 days ago

          Downvoted as you let them bait you. Escaping WhatsApp and Discord, anti-libre software, is more important.

          I don’t know what you mean by “bait” here, but…

          Escaping to a phone-number-requiring, centralized-on-Amazon, closed-source-server-having, marketed-to-activists, built-with-funding-from-Radio-Free-Asia (for the specific purpose of being used by people opposing governments which the US considers adversaries) service which makes downright dishonest claims of having a cryptographically-ensured inability to collect metadata? No thanks.

          (fuck whatsapp and discord too, of course.)