Privacy

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Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

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[SWE] Swedish government wants a back door in Signal (www.svt.se)

submitted 1 day ago by Wolfie@lemm.ee to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

99 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Swedish government wants a back door in signal for police and 'Säpo' (Swedish federation that checks for spies)

Let's say that this becomes a law and Signal decides to withdraw from Sweden as they clearly state that they won't implement a back door; would a citizen within the country still be able to use and access Signals services? Assuming that google play services probably would remove the Signal app within Sweden (which I also don't use)

I just want the government to go f*ck themselves, y'know?

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[–] troed@fedia.io 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This is where Signal's biggest problem shows. It's centralized. Matrix is the better choice since it will be up to you if you decide to break the law if it's banned, since there will still be plenty of servers you can reach.

[–] yournamehere@lemm.ee 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)

yes. but transition takes time and my mom just installed signal last year. we will get there for sure.

[–] Telorand@reddthat.com 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I moved my whole family over to Signal specifically because it was so easy. SimpleX is easier than Matrix, imo, but when Matrix is equally as easy to set up as Signal, then we'll see where things are.

The only big issue I've heard with Matrix is the current implementation doesn't scale well, due to how servers are required to clone data (or something). I think they're working on a fix, but it's still not ready for prime time, I think.

[–] sqgl@beehaw.org 3 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (1 children)

SimpleX is not easy to setup either. There are two flaws I pointed out on GitHub over a year ago which have been ignored:

FLAW #1
Scanning a QR code invite with your camera app does not work. It has to be scanned AFTER you install SimpleX using the camera function of SimpleX.

FLAW #2
Clicking on an invite received in Messenger confuses Signal because Messenger appends a question mark and some tracking code rubbish. SimpleX could easily strip the rubbish but it doesn't. It simply fails.

Simple ❌

[–] Telorand@reddthat.com 1 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

The first one is pretty standard stuff, and it makes sense why you need to do it from the primary app and not from a third party one (like the camera). You would not want that other app digesting and sending off that invite link to the bowels of Google or whatever, which defeats the purpose of limited invites.

The second one seems pretty easy to workaround. I agree that perhaps their (Facebook?) Messenger implementation should account for the tracking data they tack on, but I'd hardly consider that a deal breaker when you can copy the invite link by hand.

I work in QA, and if I was a PM, I would flatly reject the first "flaw" as introducing weaknesses into the design and assign a low priority to the second due to an easy workaround and only affecting a single app.

[–] sqgl@beehaw.org 3 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago) (1 children)

Good point re first one.

Second one is a problem for most people. They just click on a link and expect it to work. They would have to figure out themselves what the workaround is because SimpleX says something like "bad invite" or "bad link".

And even if I told them what to do, they don't even know it is possible to copy, paste, edit, hit return.

I have about 30 activists using Signal whom I would like to migrate to SimpleX. I didn't want to handhold each of them. I think you are overestimating general computer literacy out there.

Similarly I would like to migrate over 600 of them from Facebook into our own group in Lemmy however they are older people and a third of them have enough problems signing up to and navigating Facebook.

Adding to my frustration is their English illiteracy. "more than half of Americans between the ages of 16 and 74 (54%) read below the equivalent of a sixth- grade level."

[–] Telorand@reddthat.com 1 points 4 hours ago

You know, now you've got me wanting to try my hand at submitting a fix for your second issue.

So to summarize:

You copy or share a one-time contact link via SimpleX.
The sender sends it.
The receiver gets it.
The receiver clicks on the link, and Meta adds a bunch of extra tracking nonsense onto the link.
SimpleX throws an exception ("invalid link" or something, right?)

Is that how it goes, in your experience?