THE CHAT PROTOCOL OF THE FUTURE

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

THE CHAT PROTOCOL OF THE FUTURE

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

like with all things there is a solution: using terraform to manage the channels in the space

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

the terraform provider creates and owns the channel. it is the only user with the right to turn on encryption for said channels. voila. this is a perfectly reasonable solution.

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

matrix E2EE channels are fucking stupid because they leak all sorts of metadata

for example, the topic is unencrypted

reactions are unencrypted

replies reference unencrypted MXIDs so you can tell what is being replied to even if the payload itself is encrypted

do not use them. do not waste your time on them. it is not worth it.

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

or as I put it in the Bundernet #known-issues room which is acting as an FAQ

[siguza@infosec.space]

@ariadne Matrix also allows unencrypted messages in encrypted rooms, and the information that a room is encrypted may not reach a client. I reported this to both clients and the matrix spec, but was told that this was expected behaviour both times ("because we want to allow bots"). Dumbest E2E impl out there.

[alwayscurious@infosec.exchange]

@ariadne is this something that could be fixed or is it too fundamental to how Matrix works?

[tapafon@soc.ua-fediland.de]

@ariadne Are there any good, federated and E2EE IMs? Signal has good E2EE but not federation, XMPP has better federation but no E2EE out of the box.
IMHO, Matrix is currently the best of what we got, in terms of both decentralisation and privacy.

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

@tapafon when it comes to E2EE federation is not a priority for me, safety is the priority.

[kkarhan@infosec.space]

@ariadne /me laughs in #PGP/MIME & #XMPP+#OMEMO

[kkarhan@infosec.space]

@tapafon @ariadne then I guess the only good option is self-hosted #XMPP+#OMEMO and/or #PGP/MIME!

• Anything else is either a controlled opposition, honeypot, or just flatout marketing lies.

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

@kkarhan @tapafon XMPP also leaks metadata. E-mail also leaks metadata. secure messaging needs to be built around protocols designed for it.

[monal@fosstodon.org]

@tapafon @ariadne @kkarhan

Well, I'd say some public xmpp servers hosted by people actively developing clients or being active in the XSF (xmpp standards foundation) are safe to use, too. For example: conversations.im or yax.im.

Both are listed as default in Monal and I know both admins personally

You can of course use any server with Monal.

[kkarhan@infosec.space]

@tapafon @ariadne The whole "Metadata" discussion is for the most part FUD by Signal fans.

• OFC this doesn't mean I deny the problem.

  • But if you are concerned about said issue then you'd already only communicate with you own private self-hosted servers that are only reachable with a VPN over Tor.

The truth is that as of now there are no good options out there, unless you consider sending #PGP-encypted messages to a self-hosted, hidden ntfy.sh server to each other.

• I'd love to be wrong on that one, but so far #XMPP+#OMEMO & #PGP/MIME (both over #Tor) is the best practical option if you don't expect people to become unlicensed radio amateurs and illegally moonbounce their encrypted messages with WSJ…

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

@kkarhan @tapafon

> The whole "Metadata" discussion is for the most part FUD by Signal fans.

lmao no it isn't. CIA kills based on metadata.

[kkarhan@infosec.space]

@tapafon @ariadne @Monal personally, It's best to trust noone…

@monocles for examole is a good client and they certainly do iffer a great service but I don't expect any admin if any server to choose death or prison over snitching.

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

@kkarhan @tapafon

the solution to Signal being proprietary is to build a libre clone of Signal, not to pretend that Matrix and XMPP are safe.

[kkarhan@infosec.space]

@tapafon @ariadne

But if you are concerned about said issue then you'd already only communicate with you own private self-hosted servers that are only reachable with a VPN over Tor.

Source

Again: Layering & Defining your Scope is critical.

• If we expect "#TechIlliterate #Nirmies" to "migrate to #Tails & #GrapheneOS or die" they'll give us all the finger and most likely add a restraint order on top of it.

  • OFC we need to work on this scope, but I'd rather offer the "best possible" than being complicit in the Starus Quo.

Feel free to name alternatives that actually work and have actual support…

[kkarhan@infosec.space]

@tapafon @ariadne that won't hapoen because #Signal are so fucking criminally incompetent that they are hard locked-in on #aws on their inrastructure.

• It would likely be easier and cheaper in terms of personnel hours needed to just make better, hardened clients for existing protocols rather than "unfuck" the mess that is @signalapp, which at best is just a big-ass #Honeypot!

[ariadne@social.treehouse.systems]

@kkarhan @tapafon

the scope is that western democracy is in a state of freefall and we are actively losing ground to fascist oligarchs in both the US and EU.

in such a scope, cute toys like OMEMO and IRC's blowfish scripts and things of the same shape like Matrix's OLM/MegOLM do not provide an acceptable level of personal assurance.

telling people to depend on these technologies as a security engineer is malfeasance.

Signal also is not truly good enough (because it is proprietary), but it is at least accessible to non-technical people and cryptographically sound.

the real answer is Tox, but somebody needs to build the plumbing to make it accessible to non-technical people.