what messaging app do you use?
So here's the thing, every time I try to move away from Facebook messenger I run into the same problem, nobody else in my friends or family actually want to use a secure, private messenger app like signal or telegram, my wife, my parents, my in-laws, my friends they're ALL on Facebook and they will never take signal seriously enough to actually use it, it really bums me out that there are these far superior options but without anyone else using them they're pointless..
Anyway what apps do you use to stay in touch with people?
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Mandatory "don't put Signal and Telegram in the same sentence" notice. Not to be a snob, but Telegram is not "secure and private", all chats are not end-to-end encrypted by default, everything is stored on Telegram's servers with "forever-ever" retention. The end-to-end encryption is opt in, uses a dodgy encryption algorithm and has some limitations in terms of who you can contact and from what device etc.
Telegram is owned by Pavel Durov who also created the largest Russian social media platform VK, which later was overtaken by Russian state as a tool for crowd control and propaganda. Even if we assume that Pavel no longer has any ties with Russia and its "government", his biography should still raise at least some questions around whether one should trust Telegram.
And finally, Telegram seems to be going the "everything app" route lately, which makes it a one stop shop of personal communication, public channels, news, bots, stories etc. (you name it). While it is not a bad thing in objective terms, these features are not built with privacy in mind, as that would pose quite a technical challenge. This means that Telegram's privacy and security will only be sacrificed more and more to get more of the social features out of the door.
/rant over/
I agree with every point. The last paragraph doesn't have to be a problem though: telegram has very open and really nice APIs and enjoys a lot of FOSS 3rd party apps (only matched by matrix). Of course, we can only enjoy that as long the API usage is still free to use...
It is not yet, but the trajectory implies it may become a problem down the road. We're, sadly, living this decade, where you can no longer ignore where a certain service is heading and how it monetises itself.
I like to give Pavel the benefit of the doubt and assume he was not a willing participant when Russia took over VK. That said, it still happened, so what is to stop them from taking over Telegram too whether he is complicit or not?
My preference is Signal Private Messenger app, but like you, I have problems getting some friends and family to use it. So for the ones that won't, I just use Chomp SMS for my texting app.
The trick is, 90% of all your messages are probably with the same 1-3 persons. (spouse, friend, family or whatever.)
So just install the Signal app for these 1-3 persons on their phones, and you already have most of your communication going via Signal 👌🏼
The 20-80 rules applies here. Anyway, that is a strategy that works for me too. The rest would be SMS. Sending files is links to my self hosted nextcloud.
That’s exactly how I do it. No way you can get your whole work group conversation over to something else, but the bulk is a smaller circle.
My issue with signal is that their desktop app sucks. No message sync, it needs the phone as a relay and it’s made with Electron.
Signal desktop is designed to be a stand alone app that uses the phone phone to first verify the connection via QR but after that relays messages, calls, erc direct from and to the server, inrependently of the phone app.
Did they change it recently or was I mistaken?
Mistaken
I think it was like that years ago. Or at least, it felt like it and if I recall correctly the Signal Protocol docs describe the functionality in that manner.
I got my family on Signal by buying them each a drink to install it. Might be worth trying
Whatsapp in general. Telegram with my wife. Messages with my kid.
Yeah I work on a similar system
WhatsApp in general Telegram for the wife Signal for the wife whilst one of us is working (with notifications on silent)
SMS for everything else.
It's nice having things compartmentalized.
Why does wifey get her own app(s)?
Presumably because they want a higher degree of privacy / urgency when talking about their plans or the intimate details of their lives, sharing selfies or pics of the kids, fighting, flirting / sexting, and when sharing nudes, but OP doesn’t care about that higher degree of privacy for their friends who they don’t discuss those things with.
And the reason to have a separate app for work safe conversations only with her makes sense since it allows conversations to be nsfw without any extra worry (e.g., will I accidentally open this later when not at work? What if I think you’re off work already but you had to stay late to have a conversation with your boss?) or hassle.
And only having one app for everything else could be because he doesn’t have nsfw conversations there and thus can safely check them at work or because he doesn’t have important conversations there and thus doesn’t need to check them while at work. Or both.
I was doing the same. We did not want to be showing that we are online to our contacts.
So, used a different app.
Not sure if you alredy know this, but just in case - you can send messages silently for recipient in Telegram.
Just long press Send button and you will get 3 more options: send without sound, send when online and schedule.
That doesn't sound annoying at all lol
I guess at some point the kids will get to Telegram (probably using a dumb phone at the moment?)
telegram isnt really save though, so you might want to not switch to it
Agreed. May best to get family and close friends on Signal right away. Telegram is horribly unsecure.
Telegram has a better UI and desktop app. That might be the reason why some people prefer it
Similar here
It might not work for everyone, but my general advice is to go cold turkey. Inform your relatives that from now on they can contact you on Signal and then stop using FB. If they value keeping in touch with you, they will follow.
Meanwhile the relatives are potentially thinking “well I guess he doesn’t value keeping in touch with me”.
Yeah, they'll just go.
Hey brother 1, please tell your hermit brother OP that we have a get together next week. 9pm, bring beer ok.
Yes but they would be wrong. Because they would be asking you to sacrifice your privacy for them, while you are only asking them for 30MB on their phones to install Signal
That's exactly my point: let's invert the scenario as there is no reason why we should be the ones compromising. The only objective difference is the privacy of the chosen application. Even if this would be equal too, we have just a much right to demand a specific protocol as they do.
I could never do that lol. I barely care enough to talk to people and even I'd feel a little alone/I don't like inconveniencing people. I do use Telegram for some people, but Signal is just used by nobody I know.
This is exactly what I did. Its the longer game but now I have everyone I usually communicate with on Signal. This includes group chats. Now I just tell everyone I meet that I only use Signal, and they get the app and add me up. Its the only way people resistant to Signal will come around. And from my experience at least, its worked tremendously.
I use Signal, Element (Matrix), built in SMS with grapheneOS, and I self host MatterMost.
I tried Threema, but getting people to move was more difficult than Signal
wait,,, you guys have got friends?
Just another reason to not have friends. No need to worry about messages and people getting funny because you 😱 reply to them straight away! 😎
Is it wrong to only miss not having friends when I need a hand lifting up something? 😳 I really need to buy a remote controlled crane! 🤔
My choice of app is entirely based on what the contact uses.
Most of my family are on iOS so we use native iMessage and FaceTime.
I have a small group of friends that almost exclusively use discord.
Older non-iOS friends tend to use WhatsApp, younger ones Telegram.
Whatsapp for the people I can't get to move to Signal, which sadly is everyone in my family. I hate having the zuck all up in my messaging though.
Signal if possible, WhatsApp if not. I'm also trying out Session, but it's still very much work-in-progress.
Matrix
This would've been what I used if I could get anyone else to use it too.
Signal. I bullied everyone I know into using it and deleted my Facebook account, so they have no other option for contacting me.
I use telegram and signal for different purposes and people.
I'm surprised no-one mentioned XMPP/Snikket nor matrix. Both platforms are FOSS, selfhostable and thus gives you total control over your means of communication. Check them out if you're curious (I prefer matrix, but snikket is more lightweight and easier to selfhost).
I have issues just getting people off SMS, never mind using a dedicated messaging app. I used to get folks to switch to Signal, because it also used SMS… what a headache, when that functionality got removed. I ended up moving to iOS, to take advantage of iMessage. It’s not as good as Signal, but it’s still a huge improvement.
Signal with 2 people who actually moved there with me, standard messages app that came with Samsung for most people, and Facebook Messenger Lite for anything that works better there, or contacting people who I'm not close enough with to get their phone number.
WhatsApp
I got plenty of gripes with Signal (acting like a de facto proprietary app, backing up horrendously difficult, gimping the Android options in order to get to "feature parity" with the less developed iOS app, serious UI/UX missteps - the bubbles colouring debacle, no AMOLED mode etc.). Having said that, I let everybody know it IS my main messaging app - if they want to reach me, that's where I'll be. I do still use WhatsApp (barf!) and Slack, but exclusively for work-related stuff and I force close them the minute I walk out the office (if something blows up, a good, old-fashioned call will do). People who really want to keep in touch will eventually use an encrypted app, even if begrudgingly.
Telegram for family, friends, work and actually for everything I can think of.
Discord for gaming with friends, not as a messenger but as voice comms mainly.
Whatsapp for very legacy stuff, haven't had a notification in a couple of years. Maybe it's time to uninstall, finally.
Hope i am not intruding, but you are aware of the privacy-shortcomings of Telegram? They are quite severe if one is not aware of them.
I am. My good friend created telegram client using only their protocol documentation and I've been following his with very closely, and I have to say their E2E encryption is very very good. Only thing I noticed is they are using some non-standard mode of symmetric block cipher to make it stream cipher, after keys have already been exchanged, but I failed to find weakness in it, and all encryption specialists I know of failed too. It's just consecutive application of two different modes, both of which are established to be good.
Currently my job involves working with tdlib, Telegram protocol client library written by Telegram themselves; though this job doesn't really focus on security.
I do know how to avoid detection of my communication with someone via MITM, and when appropriate we go use secret chats, which are E2E encrypted, and clean them up after a day.
Normal chats and groups are as secure as Telegram as a service is. This is true for every other messenger, without exceptions. You need security, you use E2E. And even then you are as secure as your phone, which is not much for all mobile operating systems.
Well you could move to Matrix and integrate your messenger account that way it's a lot more seamless for everyone. You can get one person to do the same and you two start messaging securely via Matrix while you both keep in touch with the rest via the messenger integration. Then eventually everyone that cares even a little bit about Privacy will move over and no matter where they move you can keep in touch through Matrix and its many integrations.
How do you integrate messenger into matrix? I'm sorry if this has an obvious answer, but I'm totally zero when it comes to that, I haven't even seen it's UI.
I'm only familiar with self-hosting Matrix and if you do you install a plugin which acts as an API gateway of sorts which allows Matrix and Messenger to understand each other.
In the US so iMessages/SMS and … WhatsApp for work (god I hate it’s backgrounds). For a select few, Messenger since that’s how they connected to me.
Much prefer iMessages for its simplicity and Apple Watch integration. SMS can burn in hell.
You can select background images though. I can't change the bubble colour though like with Signal or Telegram which is annoying
The one thing you can’t do is select a white or black background. I really don’t like the text bubbles moving against a non-solid.
I recently saw something called berty that I’m still testing. Looks like a messaging app akin to lemmy.
If you like berty, check out briar. Same ideas, however briar is more mature (and uglier).
We just discussed this in the past week or two, removing under rule #4.
Telegram with my gf and family, discord with friends. Fb messenger is awful to say the least
WhatsApp with most people (because that's what everyone uses), Telegram with the people I talk to a lot (a few college friends and my parents). Insta here and there, but that's mostly for people to send me reels, I don't really use the app for anything else. I've not used Facebook or the messenger for many years.
My friend group all use SimpleX chat currently. It's arguably the most private messaging system available.
It’s in beta on mobile though and there’s no real web or desktop client so that’s not amazing…
The app itself is pretty decent at least.
Messenger/SMS when talking to friends and family.
Telegram for participating in russian-speaking groups.
Sadly my family uses mostly Facebook messenger but my husband and friends use LINE messenger 😊 it’s cute but mostly popular in Japan, Thailand, Taiwan etc
LINE - just the tip of the iceberg of privacy and security concerns. https://reports.exodus-privacy.eu.org/en/reports/jp.naver.line.android/latest/
I luckily divulged from FB messenger back in 2016. I use pulse sms on Android because I can text from a web browser. I realized I only used messenger because of the browser client. It's not private sense sms but eh, it's a pretty practical solution.
I'm not on Facebook, so don't use Messenger. I communicate with 90% of my friends and family using WhatsApp.
I would like to use Signal, but have the same problem as you - More than 90% of my friends and family don't use Signal unfortunately.
I got my brother to move to signal after Whatsapp was bought and luckily he was able to start the chain reaction moving all our friends even my parents to signal
That's great! I wish that happened with me. I got my parents on it, but others were not willing to try it out. In the end, pretty much everyone I knew stuck with WhatsApp, and we're still there.
Wow another one for the collection
Whatsapp but I'm in Europe.
Useful to have a messenger that also works over wifi. Allows you to go prepaid and save a lot of money. Think I spend 50 Euros a year on phone bills.
And yes, I know it's also facebook. It is what it is.
Well that's cute, just you and your boyfriend being nerds together
I use iMessage with my wife and mostly Signal with everyone else (rarely SMS). I actually managed to get most of my family and friends to install Signal, but then again I’m not a very social person. I deleted my FB and WhatsApp accounts.
WhatsApp because where I am it's pretty much the default app for everyone, friends, family etc, WhatsApp is the go to app here.
I don't usually use apps to talk to people IRL, I text, call, email or just physically go talk to them. Once in a while I might use Discord or Steam if we're playing something together but that's about it as far as my private life is concerned.
At work we use IP phones and Teams.
I've been using element for the best part of one year with most of my friends and family. It has some hiccups sometimes but pretty solid overall.
I use a mix of them, but fortunately no Facebook Messenger 🤢
Pretty much everyone in my country uses WhatsApp, so that's what I use. I prefer to use Signal, but nobody I know uses it nor wants to migrate, so it just ended up as a glorified SMS app until Signal removed SMS support.
I’m mostly Messenger. I have WhatsApp and standard SMS for a handful of people. I did use Signal for a while but ended up back on Messenger. I’ve used WeChat in the past but don’t have the need anymore.
I’d like to use something a bit more federated but Messenger is where the people are.
Signal. Quit Whatsapp cold turkey and just notified anyone that, yes, I'm sorry for the inconvenience, but they'll have to install yet another messenger if they want to reach me.
Signal is actually decently popular in my circle of friends. Whatsapp for the few that still don't get it and Threema with a small circle of others.
WhatsApp mostly as all my friends use it as well as FB Messenger.
I have a small group of people that use Session too.