Signal has been thrust into the spotlight after it was confirmed that the White House had been using the app for a secret chats between US officials.
Until this week, you might not have heard of Signal, but this messaging app – which is similar to WhatsApp – is now a hot topic after it was confirmed that top US officials were using it to discuss a military strike against the Houthi group in Yemen. News of this unusual way of discussing confidential plans came to light after Jeffrey Goldberg – editor-in-chief of US news site The Atlantic – was mistakenly added to the group chat where the private conversations were taking place.
The National Security Council has since said the text chain reported by Goldberg “appears to be authentic” and that it is looking into how a journalist’s number was added.
So what is Signal, and is it time to switch over to this WhatsApp rival?
Signal launched all the way back in 2014 and is owned and run by the non-profit Signal Technology Foundation, which has WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton as part of its board.
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The app prides itself on security, with its President, Meredith Whittaker, recently posting a message saying it is the “gold standard in private comms”.
Although Signal only has around 70 million users (compared to billions using WhatsApp) the company leads the way when it comes to end-to-end encryption (e2ee). That system ensures only the sender and receiver can read the content or listen in on voice calls.
The firm’s “gold standard” boast is what so many cybersecurity experts and journalists are thought to be using the platform.
Signal says that the only user data it ever keeps and stores on its servers are phone numbers, the date a user joined the service, and the last login information.
The company is also proud of the fact that it has no ads and doesn’t need to track users’ data to make money.
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“We’re open source, nonprofit, and we develop and apply e2ee and privacy preserving tech across our system to protect metadata and message contents,” explained Whittaker.
Signal’s technology is so good, WhatsApp even licenses some of its features to help keep its users safe.
“WhatsApp licenses Signal’s cryptography to protect message contents for consumer WhatsApp,” Whittaker continued.
As the row about top US officials using Signal continues, this app remains in the headlines and now could be a good time to try it out it if you want to move away from Meta-owned services such as WhatsApp.