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Oculus·

Is this the same messengering app that had the whole encryption debacle a month or two ago?

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Yes.

They Show HN'd to much controversy [1].

Started a $200,000 'crypto challenge' [2] which lots of people hated on [3].

Then someone compromised their protocol and they gave away $100,000 [4].

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6913456

[2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6931457

[3] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6936539

[4] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6948742

EDIT: /launched/Show HN/s

> They launched to ...

They "launched" several months before their appearance on HN. Though I guess it doesn't really qualify as a true launch without a "Show HN" thread, right?

To be fair: If we're talking 'replace WhatsApp', the 'had security issues' point is - well - comparable. Competitive? :)

I stay with xmpp.

WhatsApp didn't go on about their security and mock security expert's opinions, either. Telegram intentionally built their own encryption, did a poor job, summarily dismissed expert criticism, and set up a shame contest. That kind of behaviour is far worse than an "SMS-replacement" service not really putting much effort into security.

Considering that WhatsApp used port 443 but sent messages in plaintext... I think Telegram actually did better. Also since in the end, nobody actually turned out to be able to decrypt messages.

From what I remember they were arrogant in the beginning, but in the end they admitted their flaws and fixed them?

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