cross-posted from: https://discuss.online/post/34598392
FBI Director Kash Patel said Monday that he had opened an investigation into the Signal group text chats that Minnesota residents are using to share information about federal immigration agents’ movements, launching a new front in the Trump administration’s conflict there with potential free speech implications.
Patel said in an interview with conservative podcaster Benny Johnson that he wanted to know whether any Minnesota residents had put federal agents “in harm’s way” with activities such as sharing agents’ license plate numbers and locations.
Boy I sure hope those people aren’t using their real names or phone numbers…they should absolutely NOT be using Signal for this purpose. This kind of thing is why SimpleX exists.
Typically, law enforcement officers access Signal chats by obtaining a group chat member’s unlocked phone, being directly included in the group chat, or receiving copies from a participant.
From The Guardian: "The FBI has allegedly claimed that information related to the “courtwatch” Signal chat was given to them by a “sensitive source with excellent access” and said that they filed the report as a warning about “extremist actors targeting law enforcement officers and federal facilities.”
Signal itself Is secure. Like everything, however, human elements can still be penetrated. No protocol no matter how secure can protect you from a spy infiltrating a group, or a group member being coerced into handing over the content of the chats.
I didn’t say it wasn’t. The problem is when exactly this happens and then people doxx themselves in the chat.
SimpleX protects you by not requiring a phone number, and by supporting multiple and anonymous accounts.
Or even PeerSuite for that matter, moreso if a PeerSuite session is additionally ran through an anonymous protocol like I2P, assuming that’s possible. I mean, PeerSuite doesn’t require an account, doesn’t use servers, talks through encrypted WebRTC channels, and doesn’t leave a paper trail by default, coordinating protests is a perfect use case for it because people could start up a session to plan said protest, and then close the session without a trace when they’re done.
At this point, I don’t even know why Signal shouldn’t be used here. But I’m so sick of the stream of good apps that enshitify and get replaced by apps that also enshitify. I assume something like that has happened here. Is nobody left on this fucking planet that will stand up for the things they believe in?
Because Signal does not support anonymity. If someone joins the group using their real name they also happen to use in their personal lives, they’ve just doxxed themselves and painted targets on their backs.
But doesn’t Signal support disappearing messages? And end to end encryption? Meaning they’d need a recipient’s phone in order to see them at all. Although, now that I’m thinking it through in this context of a big group chat full of people you don’t/barely know, I can see the higher risk profile. So it’s bad in this circumstance, assuming messages are persistent.
Disappearing messages are a client side convention, they are not part of the protocol, they cannot be enforced. There are signal clients that never expire messages, screen capture, archive, etc
Yeah, I used to be in a group where I’m pretty sure a couple people were informants or agents. A couple people would fed-post in the Signal group sometimes.There were leaks that showed the FBI was indeed “monitoring” the group. I suspect any lefty group is infiltrated is some way.
Yes, and? It also supports screenshots.
Which is what they have.
I’m surprised screenshots are allowed in the app at all, that’s indeed pretty shit.
By default they’re not but I mean you could just pick up another camera and take a picture of the screen anyway, so you’re not really preventing anything by disabling it.
Right, so how do the other solutions solve this problem then? Kinda undercutting your own security argument with ways that NOTHING is actually secure.
As I’ve already explained, by allowing for multiple and anonymous accounts without a phone number requirement.
They can take all the screenshots they want but there’s nothing of value for them to target the participants.