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Comment by tptacek | Hacker News Reader

iMessage is fine. Don't use it deliberately.

For secure, private messages, your sane current options are Signal, WhatsApp, and Wire. Signal is the best option, but you're going to make some UX sacrifices for security. WhatsApp and Wire are extremely comparable. If you worry about implementation or operational security flaws, WhatsApp has the Facebook security team behind it, and a long-term relationship with OWS; no cryptographically secure messenger is better staffed. If you're worried about Facebook seeing your metadata, which is a sane worry, Wire is approximately as slick and usable as WhatsApp with mostly the same underpinnings.

Regardless of the underlying cryptography, in the absence of a well-reviewed published crypto messaging protocol, iMessage is basically just an optimization over SMS/MMS. It's great for that, but it shouldn't be anyone's primary messenger.

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Facebook mines WhatsApp metadata [1]. I'm not sure I'd elevate WhatsApp over iMessage, despite my respect for the OWS team. Signal is definitely the most secure.

[1] http://bgr.com/2017/05/18/facebook-whatsapp-privacy-fine/

> Facebook mines WhatsApp metadata [1].

Thomas addressed this:

If you're worried about Facebook seeing your metadata, which is a sane worry, Wire is approximately as slick and usable as WhatsApp with mostly the same underpinnings.

> I'm not sure I'd elevate WhatsApp over iMessage

I would! Consider the following: https://blog.cryptographyengineering.com/2016/03/21/attack-o...

That sort of attack is not possible against WhatsApp.

From your article:

> as implemented in versions of iOS prior to 9.3 and Mac OS X prior to 10.11.4

This fall, these will both be two major versions behind the current state of the software. Considering how openly pro-privacy/pro-security Apple has been over the past couple years, I'd expect they've fixed these issues and more by now.

I'm not making an argument that Apple is infallible; I acknowledge that it's possible there are still security flaws in iMessage. But I think that Apple is the only one of the really big tech companies who seem to be taking a privacy stand that the users can get behind, which is something to applaud.

At least Wire doesn't refuse to start and works fine even if I refuse to allow it to read my contact list and the software was open sourced:

https://github.com/wireapp

Signal doesn't work without a phone number and it doesn't have a web app, otherwise it's great if you only use it on the phone.

Given that Signal was designed specifically for mobile users not desktop users, that's not a problem for its target audience.

Wire looks promising for desktop users.

Signal does have a web app. I use it every day.

Signal Desktop is hardly a web app in the sense that you open a website and you're done. You need to use Chrome and you need your phone. It's probably more secure yet rather inconvenient.

AFAIK, Moxie(OWS Founder) was responsible for the integration of the Signal protocol into WhatsApp. So, if there are any design/implementation flaws in the underlying protocol, wouldn't they also be in Whatsapp too ? Again, this might not be the case and everything might be properly vetted but this just slightly increases the chance of an error propagating and be in both the messengers.

Trust WhatsApp? You must be joking. We can't see the source and it's owned by an advertising company.

I'd trust iMessage over WhatsApp any day of the week. The parent company doesn't make money by potentially knowing who I am and what I say.

It would be nice if we could reason about security and privacy properties of software simply by considering which company or organization provided it, but that is not how software security --- particularly cryptographic software security --- works in the real world.

If the msg content is encrypted what metadata should I "worry about" when using WhatsApp IF I am okay with not being anonymous (eg. for everyday use with friends). What can FB tell me based on JUST WhatsApp? (let's say they haven't connected my identities with FB yet)

Here's another way to think about it: privacy and security are related but not the same thing. If you care more about PRIVACY, use Signal or Wire. If you care more about SECURITY, use Signal or WhatsApp. I care more about security, because privacy controls don't much matter if there's an exploitable vulnerability anywhere in the messaging stack. But you could reasonably argue that privacy is an everyday concern and security is a black-swan concern --- that is, when we're comparing Double Ratchet protocol messengers like Wire, Signal, and WhatsApp.

What about Telegram? Is there a reason you haven't listed it? I find it better that WhatsApp.

Since they use their own in house crypto, most people don't consider it trustworthy:

https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/49782/is-telegr...

Telegram can be confusing for users. Encryption needs to be turned on, and isn't available in group chats.

https://www.ieee-security.org/TC/SP2017/papers/84.pdf Is super interesting when thinking about secure messaging from the perspective of ordinary folk.

This has been discussed before. Read these two threads:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6915741

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10713064

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