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Comment by Reedx | Hacker News Reader

They could ban Signal too.

Edit: Signal is now #1 on the app store. Speech that was removed will obviously just migrate and be encrypted. Though not as public, the actual speech is still going to be communicated between people and groups. So why wouldn't Signal be next?

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I wish people would stop making this claim without supporting it in any way. It's kind of a ludicrous claim. Signal bears no resemblance to Parler, and there are various other reasons why this analogy is poorly drawn, like the fact that Signal's traffic is entirely private and Apple would no way of knowing the contents of said traffic, and the fact that Signal could not possibly "moderate" said traffic for the same reason.

You make a good point. Though I have to agree with Snowden when he says this will be remembered as a turning point in the battle for control over digital speech.

A good argument could be made we don't need end to end encryption without a back door. And in this environment, there may be little political opposition.

A lot of the speech that's being labeled as "inciting violence" on Parler would feel different if it was spoken privately. The fact that it's being communicated publicly puts it in a different category, almost like you're saying it on TV or in the proverbial town square. I don't think this is setting any sort of precedent for attacking private communications.

I don't think it's any secret that groups were planning an attack on the Capital before the days events started in DC.

Were those insurgents domestic terrorists?

What if it is to be found that they primarily used Signal for example to communicate their plans with each other?

> A good argument could be made we don't need end to end encryption without a back door.

No, but don’t think it can. But you can try.

If terrorists use Signal to plan and carry out attacks, why shouldn't the technology be regulated or banned?

I do recall various other chat apps being painted as being used by "terrorists" in the past. For some, the fact that bad people can communicate at all is something they would not like to have, at the expense of good people having access to those tools in some cases.

I think the Signal surge is due to many people disagreeing with WhatsApp's new terms of use and privacy policy. I saw many people in my network advocating a move to Signal and Telegram after Facebook pushed the update.

Signal isn’t a social network. It’s just encrypted text messages.

"There is no explicit limit to the number of people that can be added to a Signal group chat. However, if the group becomes very large, it can become difficult to manage and you may notice that messages take a bit longer to send."

Seems like it wouldn't bet too hard for it to become a social network.

Signal doesn’t focus on discovery. It requires the relationship to form outside of the app.

They would have to apply that metric to ALL communication apps. I don't think it would fly.

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