i’ve been meaning to switch fully to signal, but since not many people where i live wanna switch too, i often tell them to just call me. Is that private enough as a privacy conscious individual?

  • FineCoatMummy@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    1·
    2 hours ago

    Phone call tapping needs a warrant.

    This is correct for the US, and I think quite a few others. Generally that req has been upheld in the US.

    It is also correct that there is little to no technical protection against intercepting the content. The only protection you have is legal.

    Hence why discussions become confusing. You get people insisting there is no protection. They are correct, in a way. Then you get people insisting there is. They are also correct, in a different way. Then, here’s an example of when the legal protection failed, therefore, the legal protection does not exist. Which is generally wrong.

    To add even more confusion, the NSA was collecting metadata about the phone calls of over 100M people! Per Snowen’s disclosures,

    Under the order, the numbers of both parties on a call, as well as the location data, unique identifiers, time of call, and duration of call were handed over to the FBI, which turned over the records to the NSA

    But that is not the same as collecting and processing the audio.

    It is important to be specific about the exact thing you are worried about. I live in the USA, and for USA-to-USA conversations over the traditional phone network, I generally do not worry about the audio being interepted without a warrant. Even though my only protection is legal. If I was going to have an extremely sensitive conversation, esp if I was afraid of disclosure of who I talked to, I would chose a different method to talk. But not b/c I think the risk is very high of my phone audio being surveiled. Just from an abundance of caution.