very few people use signal

exFAT then

The question is: What privacy do I loose by signing up to Signal with a phone number instead of hypothetically a username.

if you could sign up with a username, your account couldn’t be linked to a real world identity. also the government wouldn’t have a phone number to send state malware to (unlike signal the telephony system is full of security vulnerabilities)

If you are being monitored, they know your phone number.

if you personally are monitored then yes they know your phone number. but here it’s the other way around. you became a person of interest because you use signal.

If you are not being monitored, nobody knows you are using Signal.

no. everybody who has the power to issue data requests to signal, and also has access to a database binding phone numbers to identities, knows that you are using signal.

except if they use that as a sign you are a terrorist, but then they just wanted to monitor you anyway in the first place

exactly. what is the question?

also its not “monitor me” and “monitor you”, but “monitor whoever is using the service” more closely, and as it seems, retaliate against them.

and the phone number, which is clearly user information, now being used against the users

the irrededeemable fact that you are using it, which matters because the government now just targets all the signal users. they can’t read your messages, so they are applying guilt by association.

it all does not matter when most people register with their primary phone number that is already tied to their name

to be fair, this is not “asking for permission”. that’s what xiaomi is doing, but not this. on xiaomi phones, to be able to unlock the bootloader or grant higher permissions to adb, you have to insert a live sim card, log in with an “mi account”, and have the server decide whether you are allowed doing that. for unlocking you additionally have to wait for several days, if you can get the approval process started that is, and hopefully you will be allowed.

unless it turns out this requires internet connection, a sim card, or a google account, this is just a safety procedure. and it’s hard to say but this world is so full of incredibly dumb people that all both need and want to use shiny smartphones for all that convenience and social media addiction, that a safeguard like this is needed.

to be fair, this is not “asking for permission”. that’s what xiaomi is doing, but not this. on xiaomi phones, to be able to unlock the bootloader or grant higher permissions to adb, you have to insert a live sim card, log in with an “mi account”, and have the server decide whether you are allowed doing that. for unlocking you additionally have to wait for several days, if you can get the approval process started that is, and hopefully you will be allowed.

unless it turns out this requires internet connection, a sim card, or a google account, this is just a safety procedure. and it’s hard to say but this world is so full of incredibly dumb people that all both need and want to use shiny smartphones for all that convenience and social media addiction, that a safeguard like this is needed.

I generally agree but

They need to stick with just the browser, period. Stop trying to drift into other areas. Firefox has unfortunately gotten too heavy for what it should be, and adding even more features (good or bad) doesn’t help the core performance.

they are trying to find better ways to finance themselves than google search contracts. that’s why they are coming up with all their paid services

disregard what I said on my other comment. I believe it to be correct, but despite the post title this is not a VPN, but a proxy, as the article says, that needs to decrypt the HTTPS traffic.

weird choice to be honest.

they were explaining what happens with a proxy server, but with only a VPN there’s no proxy server or other such decrypting middleman. but in short: TLS was made to protect against exactly this: the network between. only thing leaked is the domain you are connecting to

nobody said a thing about what AI thinks

I mean this thread didn’t mention archive.today, it’s another reply to the top comment that did

reformers are the exception, they don’t represent the class

that’s a different thread

don’t let them know your lemmy account if you do it

in some countries it’s fallen out of fashion. in others, people are too lazy to bring a slim wallet with themselves and select the bills and coins every time they want to spend

most apps already work, and it’s been always that way. those that don’t, it’s because they depend on the google services system app (microg helps here). or they require google play integrity to pass which is not something that can be hacked around, because this is its exact purpose: denying to work on open source aosp systems. it is security, but not for you, but against you.

I’m sure there was, but I’m not sure there still is.

maybe those who still do that carry around a google infested phone.