Mastodawn

Today, I finally deleted WhatsApp

https://sh.itjust.works/post/57280235

Today, I finally deleted WhatsApp - sh.itjust.works

It has been a long journey. I have been gradually convincing my family, close relatives and friends to make the switch to Signal for over two years. I am already the “tech support guy” in all my circles so most didn’t really question it. Most of my friends are quite tech-savvy, and some even did use Signal before I talked to them about it. This also filtered out some “friends” who were never that close to me to begin with. So, that’s a bonus, I guess. Overall, my recommendation to others interested would be to tell people how much you don’t like Meta’s business model instead of the privacy aspect. I already ditched Facebook and Instagram many years ago, and this helped defend my point a bit better.

AnUnassumingStick 3d ago

Lucky, my social circle’s technologically illiterate AND doesn’t care what happens to their personal data so I’m stuck with both Facebook & WhatsApp :/ One saving grace is that I don’t have either installed on my “main” phone.

Signal’s not great for privacy either tbf - Meta is just a very very low bar to be better than.

AcornTickler 3d ago

Signal’s not great for privacy either tbf

Why do you think so? Yeah, it is not anonymous due to requiring a phone number, but all media and metadata are end-to-end encrypted.

AnUnassumingStick 3d ago

Ended up having to do some more digging on Signal as I was under the impression more metadata was getting left unencrypted than there is.

My bigger concerns are with whom Signal employs and the very questionable decisions the company’s made.

Their VP of engineering was at Facebook managing Onavo VPN when that was spying on teenagers using Snapshat. Then, Signal had known their desktop encryption keys were stored in plaintext for six years and only fixed it after public outrage.

To the best of everyone’s knowledge, Signal’s netcode is solid, but leadership with a history in privacy scandals & negligence towards clear privacy holes is very iffy IMO.

irelephant [he/him]3d ago

Could you be mixing it up with matrix/element, which leaks a lot of metadata.

Broiled_Tofu 3d ago

I feel bad for Europeans or folks who need what’s app. Needing Big Tech that impeds social media into your texting app is insane.

It’s definitely unfortunate that it’s a proprietary closed system owned by big tech. On the other hand, SMS/MMS is a pretty bad user experience by comparison, and it’s unencrypted.

SleepyPie 3d ago

And to think in ~6 months you’ll probably need to go through that whole song and dance again when you switch them to Matrix 😔

unadvised0625 3d ago

Why is that?

Kilgore Trout 2d ago

I don’t know @[email protected]’s reasons, but I am concerned about Signal Messenger LLC being based in the United States, and it being centralised, on AWS servers no less.

technomage 3d ago

I don’t think I’ve ever actually used WhatsApp. An old boss tried to tell me that it was mandatory for my job (there was a group chat where management insisted on tracking every single thing we did). Fortunately, Ontario has somewhat decent labour laws where if you’re required to use an app or something on your phone, your employer now gets to pay for your phone bill! Needless to say, she backed off pretty quick lol

Also, the concept of NEEDING WhatsApp for daily life is wild to me. It’s not the norm for businesses, banks, etc to require it, and if someone says they do, it’s probably a scam here…

WhatsApp has significant market dominance in Europe, to the point that only one or two people I know who live on that continent don’t use it. If you give someone your phone number in Europe, they will almost certainly send you a WhatsApp message, not an SMS.

It’s not a need in the sense that you’ll die without it, but not having it adds significant friction to social relationships.

technomage 3d ago

That’s… Wow! Here, people prefer to use non-SMS options for messaging too, but if you give someone a phone number it’s pretty much assumed you’re getting an SMS unless they ask if you have WhatsApp, signal, or whatever else. That said, using Messenger is still pretty common here, as much as I’d wish it would die off. It is, slowly, but it needs to be quicker lol

If I put someone’s number into the contacts on my phone, I will see what messaging apps are connected to that phone number in most cases. If they have Signal, I’ll try that first. I’ll try WhatsApp before SMS because it’s a better user experience and probably encrypted.

technomage 3d ago

Okay, that’s both cool and scary lol and Fair, yeah. I think WhatsApp would be the last on my list. I’d rather my telecom company siphon the data over Meta, but I get you

How much of the data Meta can siphon is an open question as I understand it. WhatsApp definitely uses encryption, but there are a bunch of ways the client could send them the cleartext, especially if one allows their chatbot into a conversation.

It’s hard to say which is worse. I have a fair number of contacts on Signal now, and I find that’s a good balance of easy and trustworthy.

At least Europe rarely uses WhatsApp for business porposes. It’s worse in Asia and South America where WhatsApp and Facebook are literally the internet, including the enterprise space.

And the reason it’s less the default in the US isn’t because people are so forward-thinking to use signal, but iOS being so uniquitous that people use iMessage.

People everywhere are just somewhat lazy and just don’t know better.

And the reason it’s less the default in the US isn’t because people are so forward-thinking to use signal, but iOS being so uniquitous that people use iMessage.

I don’t think that’s quite it. iOS wasn’t as popular in the USA when WhatsApp use really started to take off elsewhere.

Instead, I think it was a combination of unlimited SMS plans being the norm, and most Americans having few international contacts.

unexposedhazard 3d ago

Good job!