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Comment by mbq | Hacker News Reader

Isn't TextSecure already built into Cyanogen SMS app? And anyway dependent on the Google Play Services?

Correct, the push notification aspect is dependent on Google Play Serices (in both the stand-alone app and the CM SMS integration). But sending encrypted SMS messages works without Google Play, so the app still has functional aspects.

TextSecure uses Google's push service because there is no viable alternative available.

Than, what's the point of using a secure communication app if you must also install a spying rootkit to make it work? For me it makes the whole TS not viable.

seems that they are trying to replace Google's push API with a websocket-based solution. See https://github.com/WhisperSystems/TextSecure/issues/1106

Sadly, the author of TextSecure doesn't think so. He thinks side-loading of apps and alternate app stores are a problem (he says that allowing installs that don't come from Play store is "returning to desktop security model which is completely broken" [1]). He also opposes TextSecure being on f-droid, etc.

[1]: https://github.com/WhisperSystems/TextSecure/issues/127

I'm also running CyanogenMod without the mothership, and that's exactly what I thought. While apps such as TextSecure appear to have a good reputation needing to install probably backdoored proprietary software to obtain them seems to defeat the objective.

Please see http://support.whispersystems.org/customer/portal/articles/1...

If you can suggest viable alternatives, I am certain that the team would love to drop Google from it.

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