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Comment by Teckentrup | Hacker News Reader

What does exit the UK market mean here though?

Presumably that it won't appear in the Apple App Store or Google Play?

Presumably that's more of an issue for the iOS ecosystem... But for android you just switch from using play to FDroid or an APK, right?

I presume a sufficiently irked UK wouldn't be able to do anything more, as Signal already as ways of circumventing traffic blocking within specific states?

Doesn't this just stop less motivated or technical folk getting signal... But for anyone motivated, or with nefarious intent, I don't see how this prevents anything the bill targets as a harm.

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It's more symbolic than anything else. The Signal folks don't really care how effective this action would be. Sure, they can pull the app from the app stores for the UK region, disable any accounts registered with a UK phone number and/or block connection attempts from UK IP addresses. Some people will work around it, but many won't have the technical know-how to do so. The end result that's important, though, is that the Signal Foundation will be able to announce "due to anti-privacy laws enacted in the UK, Signal can no longer provide service in the UK".

I don't think it's as frivolous as you're making it out to be. By restricting the legitimate availability of the software it limits the use of it by entities more accountable than the average individual. Companies and governments themselves that use Signal will either be cut off from using the service or swallow the risk of using software they've circumvented controls in order to keep using. The likely result is that suddenly those companies and governments have a tangible motivation to pressure the UK (etc) to knock this shit off. It also sets a precedent for vendors of encryption-dependent software. Imagine if your bank followed suit and pulled out of the UK, arguing that eliminating the reliability and security of online banking would put their customers in danger? All of the above sounds pretty "effective" to me.

Signal could block all UK IP addresses from accessing its messaging server. UK could require ISPs to block access to Signal messaging servers. Both of these are fairly trivial (my understanding is that UK already forces filtering on ISPs for e.g. pornography).

Of course you are correct that anyone motivated and/or technical enough could still access Signal. However, their less motivated/less technical contacts won't be using it any longer.

The government is basically asking the bad actors to self-identify through their continued use of Signal.

So perhaps a new UK-focused app that everyone sideloads?

Except for iOS users, which is roughly 1/2 of all people in UK (according to a quick search).

Why should Signal block UK IPs anymore so than China IPs, though? If anything, I hope that they have a page on the website specifically for UK users explaining the law and how to break it by installing the .apk directly.

One could interpret "leaving the UK market" in such a way.

Another reason why those arguing against centralized messaging systems as opposed to de-centralized, federated were correct. Who wants Signal and their US-centric board to decide they can do anything.

If Signal were really sticking it to the UK-vassal state they would be able to continue to provide end-to-end encryption and force their EU aircraft carrier to go through the public, international embarrasment of running their own version of the Great Firewall.

> What does exit the UK market mean here though?

Maybe just disable all accounts registered with +44 telephone numbers?

It would have to involve blocking known UK IP addresses as well as removing the app from British play/apple stores at a minimum.

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