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this post was submitted on 24 Sep 2024
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Technology
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Does anybody really use Telegram for "privacy"? People can't seriously believe that thing is secure. Their FAQ indirectly states that group chats aren't encrypted and explicitly states that "secret chats" are.
I have never recommended Telegram to anybody. It's just like another facebook, AOL, ICQ, or whatever messenger. I actually don't personally know a single telegram user who uses secret chats. They are quite useless. They don't sync across devices.
Anti Commercial-AI license
Oh believe me, group chats are encrypted. Problem is, most of them are public, so that's only to protect them from being exposed to dump/search server side. And yeah, their encryption is not e2e. That's encryption nonetheless.
Telegram's "encryption" does not protect in any way against dump/search server side (outside of secrets chats).
Telegram's "encryption" only protects from your ISP spying, and it's the kind of encryption that everyone implements. Any website that does not implement such encryption would show a big red "Not secure" warning in your browser.
In their explanation it was specifically stated that it should be either impossible or too difficult. Keeping keys and content separately, that's what it's about iirc. Either way the point of telegram is not in privacy for everyone. You trade protection for convenience (cloud data and great clients), and if you want you can use secret chats. That's it. Seeing their user base, it suits most people. We'll see if their server data gets leaked or something, though it didn't happen yet.
Just use something that isn't a child abuse Russian chat app. There are so many better options.
Use for what? Are there alternatives that aggregate news, have bot support, non-electron clients and immediately sync between desktop and mobile?
Yes? You aren't going to find a one to one telegram clone. A replacement isn't a clone
Matrix is probably what you want but it isn't encrypted e2ee by default.
Signal and Simplex chat have full encryption but are closer to a WhatsApp alternative
You know I wasn't asking for a replacement. You're suggesting e2ee-first software to people who might not really need it in the first place.
Personally, when I think about all the quirks and requirements that must be met for some chat to happily accept a new member in a e2ee scheme, I get mad. My daily chats, gifs and cat photos aren't worth everyone's effort and discomfort.
Also, I use WhatsApp not because I like it but because it's easier than forcing dozens of people to use something else. I hate it because of how it works, and it doesn't have anything to do with e2ee part (it's worthless for stuff I use WhatsApp for). I like that it dropped electron though - I value my ram.
They're lying? Encryption at rest does not protect at all against the server snooping around. When you send or receive a message, the server has to see it in plaintext unless you have E2EE. So there is a way for them to access the plaintext of any message you receive, and it happens automatically billions of times per day. It's pretty easy.
That's wrong. There is no plaintext transfer. While a lot of stuff can potentially happen on server every second as you said, it doesn't happen according to them. I don't trust that fully either but that's their argument. You can look up encryption schemes in their faq.
I didn't say that there was any network plaintext transfer. I said the server needs to have access to the plaintext at some point.
That's not actually what they say, because it would be the cryptographic equivalent of claiming they invented a new color.
They talk about encryption at rest without mentioning the rest of their infrastructure to confuse the hell out of people that don't understand encryption. Given your comments it seems to work.
That's not what their marketing says.
Most people have zero idea what kind of security telegram provides.
Are you talking about encryption at rest? Regardless, encryption by the server is worthless. It's exactly why admins can delete content in chat rooms.
Edit: that was over the top. My bad. It's not worthless. It's just doesn't really enhance privacy like E2E and I find it disingenuous to say "my chat app is encrypted" when you mean server encryption not E2E.
Anti Commercial-AI license
You're still missing the fact that public chats can't be adequately protected.
FWIW when they said that the "e2e" boom has yet to happen.
Depends what you mean by "adequately" 🤔 With perfect forward secrecy (which matrix and signal have), seeing past messages isn't possible. Seizing the servers is also not very useful unless people are connecting directly to the server. Anonymous public chats running on overlay networks like I2P and TOR might not even need encryption (although I wouldn't trust a server that didn't).
Anti Commercial-AI license
Where something publicly exists anyone can set up a local archive to capture anything, regardless of what's available at the moment of joining the chat. Also telegram has such a setting too. It's useless when someone really wants to get you. They won't need an access to telegram servers to get you.
Maybe client to server but that's not saying much