I really like Telegram and these features but I don’t use it because they don’t have end2end encryption as default. Also you can’t create a secret group chat that you can start from your phone and continue from your Mac.
That's why it is not on by default and why it doesn't work for groups. Most users favor convenience over strict e2e.
which is solvable
Signal and Matrix have two distinct approaches to this
Signal, for example, copies the received messages into per-device queues that belong to the same identity. The problem for the user is that the user has no visibility into what is really assigned to his identity and where copies of his messages are routed encrypted by which keys; it could be used to implement anything between CALEA to Prism access.
I'm not familiar with the Matrix approach, so I won't comment on it.
Myself I use TG extensively with friends, family, girlfriend and I think I've used secret chats once when the gf wanted to send a naughty photo.
It's not that I don't have anything to hide, it's just I choose what to say according to the environment and I feel the features of telegram far outweigh the con of not having e2e at all times.
Is this true? From anecdata every e2e encrypted platform I used is much lower quality than the alternatives (iMessage, Signal, etc). Things like multi-device sync don’t work that well. Is this really just a coincidence? Telegram claims they can’t provide the same quality chat (and snappy cross platform crispness is really their competitive advantage) with e2e. Is this just a fake limitation?
The other bigger drawback with E2E is that the servers of those platforms don't store the chats permanently (they store it for about 30 days or so to deliver the messages to devices when they come online, depending on the platform). So syncing chat history across devices gets affected by this choice (it could still be done, but the complexity and speed of syncing grows a lot).
Wire does E2E for all chats and syncs all chats across devices. But it too doesn't sync chat history on newer linked devices. It also took the (what I consider as inferior) choice of using Electron for its desktop apps, which makes it quite sluggish.
Not true: Matrix is fine with storing messages permanently
No multi device support.
No transcoding for video.
No shared history for group chats.
Scaling get progressively harder with increasing participants.
That's an issue with your client and protocol, not with e2e
> No shared history for group chats.
Same
> Scaling get progressively harder with increasing participants.
Same
> No transcoding for video.
Now that's a more palpable issue. Also no size reduction of photos which is probably more used as a media.
That's issue with distributing the keys among multiple parties.
> No shared history for group chats.
> Same
Exactly. What's e2e good for, if you give keys to the entity that does the archiving?
All those issues are protocol-related. E2E only stipulates that the message can't be read between the two ends, it doesn't say you can't send a technical message for making a better UX.
Re-sending parts of the chat kind of removes the guarantees of the secret chat (just like backups defeat the purpose of e2e). These apps have also expiring and non-screenshotable messages, you don't want to resend that.
Ideally, all messages sent should be only decryptable by given set of keys (i.e. one key for each device used by each party of the chat; or, depending on the size of the message, ephemeral key used for message encryption, decryptable by each device that is supposed to receive it). Now the key distribution is the non-solved part.
Now, secret chats don't necessarily mean "this message can only be read by one device". To answer your second paragrah I disagree: a message shouldn't be sent to a given set of keys but to a given set of participants. Each participant may have one or more devices and should be able to read messages whatever way they want.
Also key distribution is "solved" by not counting on the user to do it but doing it for them: see what Matrix, Signal, Deltachat, XMPP (OMEMO) and probably others are doing.
That the user won't see on his device any messages sent before enrolling the new key? That's the point. Otherwise, the user should use the normal/non-e2e messages.
Thus, the key distribution as it is "solved" is being lax with them.
For example: You have a group with 100 Members, do you encrtpy each message you send 99 times for each recipient? Not likely. So you use a send key that everyone else can decrypt.
But then what if the group changes? Does everyone has to replace their send-keys, because the party that left can still decrypt all those messages otherwise.
That means you have to do n-1 key exchanges whenever a party leaves or joins. Otherwise it wouldn't be secure anymore.
There are some clever ideas about key exchanges, but so far the messengers that implement them are not widely used and since there is no profit in it, no one is in a hurry to compete.
Of course you have something to hide, it's called privacy. There is absolutely no reason your private life should be public by default, so why accept it ?
What I talk about to my friends, girlfriends and family are all on different "privacy levels". If the chats with my friends were disclosed, I'd probably be made a laughing stock at most but it's no big deal. My family ones would probably be most boring, and the ones with my girlfriend could be material for a soap opera, and embarrassing.
But it's not the end of the world if someone at Telegram can read them of if they were disclosed by some hacker group.
My point is that it is an amazing chat app and have way too many benefits for me to not use it, but I _am_ fully aware that there are a chance what I write can be read by someone else, and therefore I take care what I write about.
Oh, and thank you for keeping the discourse on a respectful level. :)
That’s a privilege many people don’t have. Think about sexual preferences, controversial opinions or health problems that can be disadvantageous in their career or when obtaining insurance. Or that aren’t problematic now but might be in the political climate in 20 years.
You could argue that people worrying about this still have the choice to use an E2E encrypted messenger. After all different needs are served by different products. But if this behavior becomes the norm, people who hide possibly disadvantageous information can be identified simply by their messenger use, partially defying the purpose of hiding their information in the first place.
I consider this a very strong argument for privacy as the default regardless of particular people's lack of a need for privacy.
EDIT: Removed remarks that could be misunderstood as snark.
Privacy is definitely not binary, but to me it is a bit like using Libre software. You can't realistically expect to live on the 21st century internet with the entirety of services and viewpoints it offers and only use Libre software. At this point you have to either follow your values and stick to a very small part of it that is guaranteed to work on your browser rejecting non-Free javascript, or you can make concessions and accept a bit of proprietary bits here and there. But you can still decide to be Libre-first and accept non-Libre from there, on a bit-by-bit basis. That is what I and others are talking about with e2ee first: Instead of asking "what is worth being hidden and being made public", I feel the more just mindset should be "supposing everything is private by default, what can I disclose and to whom". Your threat assumption regarding your conversations is a good example: of course every software has bugs and all your messages could be read by Telegram. But you're behaving as if Telegram might read it one day, when I believe you should believe as if Telegram is reading it every day. The danger is not that Telegram can make a soap opera out of your drama but that the whole world can.
As you say you take care what you write about and that is a good thing to do. So, following up: if you don't want anyone to be able to read it, then let's go to the end of this and make sure no one physically can read it, by default. Instead of asking what kind of conversations require e2e, let's ask what kind of conversation doesn't require e2e
Something like Matrix are likely the best you can go (a federated network where bad actors are likely to get called out, I have high expectations for its future), but apart from this I consider e2e a red herring* as e2e would also need to include source code, compilation, installation, and platform. it is not a magic incantation that fixes privacy (not to talk about metadata)
we find reasonable to have not e2e emails, not e2e file sharing, not e2e phone calls. personally I care more about the long term commitment telegram has publically and repeatedly made (and the my assumption that they do not expect to be able to come out unscathed from obvious leaks)
I understand that others might want more, no problem with that, but there is so much more than just e2e encryption.
*telegram should still offer secret groups
That's where we disagree: I don't find those to be reasonable but I have to make do with them because that's where the current status is. That doesn't refrain me from using e2ee file sharing by default, or doing e2ee phone calls by default, only resorting to the not encrypted when I can't do otherwise.
I'm not saying that e2ee must be the target for everyone and is the solution to all problems. I'm saying that there are very few situations where e2ee blocks features, so for most use cases if it works transparently for the user, why not use it ? It's the next step after point-to-point encryption like TLS: if you can have it on at all times without inconveniences, why not use it ? Both of those make the overall situation better with no discernable downsides.
Security is good, but sometimes truted third parties are "gooder", maybe we disagree on the next example but I like that the police is able to forcefully block some financial transactions, or that my bank can disable my credit card remotely.
e2ee encryption with convenience is also very likely to be broken by design,
If you don’t send me your chats then I assume you want privacy after all.
Ps: hard drive image clones should also do the trick.
Sending it to the company promising secure communication, company which delivers the best convenience messaging UX in the whole fucking world without any ads...
Well, if you can’t see the difference...
I am choosing iMessage with complete e2e every time I can, but iMessage is iOS only and telegram is many years ahead in user convenience even from it.
You might as well continue pushing for pgp for secure email.
User convenience is not optional.