Signal; Instant Private Messaging Platform

Repository

e.g. https://github.com/utopian-io/utopian.io

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Communication is part of our culture and lifestyle today. All over the world, people communicate in different ways and in different languages. Communication is meant to help pass the information which the receiving party can comprehend and maybe provide a reply or feedback. Over the years communication has advanced with technology, with GSMs and smartphones now able to help you communicate with others over a very distant geographic area.

One of the major ways people now communicate with friends all over the world is through Social Media. Facebook which was the first social media has over 2 billion users, that is about a third of the earth's population. But communication comes with the need for privacy. Some things you say or type on social media are not meant for public eyes or hearing. There are multiple cases on social media about leaked chats and sometimes users data being used by the company for profit. Even Facebook, the giant social media has been accused of selling users data. I have a solution to this issue of privacy when chatting with a friend through social media. It is an advanced privacy messaging platform called Signal.

WHAT IS SIGNAL

Signal is an encrypted instant messaging, voice and video calling platform that allows users to communicate with friends all over the world with the security of privacy. Using signal is free and also helps you escape SMS charges when sending messages to friends. Since I started using signal, I must confess that it has some pretty amazing features. Privacy aside, it is really fun to use signal to chat with your friends.

SOME AMAZING FEATURES OF SIGNAL

• Disappearing Messages
  This is a very unique feature and signal is the only platform I have come across this. This sets a timer on your messages once they have been read by the receiving party then deletes the message once the time elapses. I've had a lot of fun using this, especially in the group chats. I remember once it was used for a recharge card giveaway so the fastest fingers could win. It was set to 5 seconds, once it delivers in the group, it deletes after 5 seconds. On the serious aspect of this, this can be used for chats you don't want storing or backing up permanently on the server. This is simply amazing.

• Incognito Keyboard
  With growing technology, keyboards now have a learning ability. They learn your writing patterns, the words you use together, your frequently used sentences e.t.c. So in a way, they save your data. With incognito keyboard settings enabled on signal, the keyboard learning is disabled. This makes your chats as private as it can get.

• Fast Messenger
  Nothing more fun than a chat that delivers swiftly. My experience so far with the peer to peer chats on signal has been quite interesting. It does not require much service to deliver a message to the other party. Well, I can boast of it being faster than the Facebook Messenger in terms of chat delivery. It could be because Facebook handles a larger volume though.

• Set As Default SMS/MMS App
  Signal is multi-purpose. It still creates a means for you to message your contacts who are not on signal through SMS and MMS. All you need to do is set signal as your default SMS app. Sending messages to those not on signal may draw charges but to those on signal is free.

Other Amazing features in Signal Messenger include

• video and voice calls
• encrypted chats

Signal also has some shortcomings in its usage. Although it has a dedicated team always providing updates to bugs and other issues, some issues have been there for too long. There are two major problems that have persisted;

• Bad Video Calls
  The video calls on signal aren't really what any user would want to experience. The voice calls can be rated a bit above average, but the video calls are below average. I keep hearing echoes of my voice while talking, low quality and the person you are calling get to hear what you say about 3 secs after you say it. I hope the team puts more efforts into improving the video call quality.

• Slow Message Delivery In Group Chats
  Although I haven't experienced this personally, there's been lots of complaints about messages taking time to deliver in groups with a large number of participants. I'm in only two groups and we are barely 30 in each, so everything has been working fine for me. In response to the complaints, the admins claimed it is due to the group being encrypted. Not just the messages sent are encrypted, but the general group's metadata e.g, the membership list, group title and group icon. None of this information is stored on the server. If this causes some inconvenience to its users, I guess they need to find a way to bypass it because nowadays, most large group chats are used for promotional purposes.

CONCLUSION

Signal Private Messenger is a great social media to adopt in this sensitive world we live in today. Keeping what you say privately without any third party interference. This will be well suited for businessmen who run big and private deals, to keep their deals and negotiations in private without any fear of getting leaked. For the average man, having that sense of privacy is still a big relief. No matter how open you can be, everyone has something private to say, signal is that platform for you to say it.

Links

Github profile https://github.com/tony-duke

Project Repository https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android

Resources: All photos are screenshots from my android device