Comment by floatingatoll
7 years ago
Forcing iMessage to open will immediately result in MITM iMessage proxies that users can use to store iMessages that are meant to auto-delete, so that they can violate the wishes of the other party. These do not exist today because Apple binds iMessage to your hardware and bans your entire device when anyone is found to be operating such a service, either for themselves or others.
Do you want open source clients that can be altered to ignore all privacy criteria — or do you want closed-source clients that make a good faith effort to adhere to auto-deletion protocols?
Pick one. There is no middle ground.
You can violate the wishes of the other party by taking a screenshot or, in the extreme, a photo of the screen. You're only preventing the very lazy/unmotivated from retaining messages.
Correct, screenshots are a viable attack against both closed and open source platforms. Preventing casual retention is the best you can hope for, and is a worthy goal regardless that it does not result in the perfection of a Faraday cage’d clean room
So, your threat model includes MITM servers, but not cameras? It seems a little silly to worry about the MITM problem when you can simply snap a photo already.
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Actually apples approach results in a MUCH lower level of retention than other providers even if someone can screenshot all conversations
Just like with Snapchat, Auto-delete is a fantasy and is not worth sacrificing security or privacy for.
iMessage doesn't have any kind of auto deleted messages - it's a feature that messages are persistent across all your devices.
Incorrect. Audio messages are deleted two minutes after playback by default.
Which is a receiver-side setting and can be set to one year. Your point is moot.
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That's a client side feature meant to save disk space.