Comment by daneel_w
1 year ago
> Is this true for Signal too? I thought it wasn’t.
It is, because you cannot use Signal without giving them your mobile phone number, and from that point onward they (and anyone they might be sharing data with) know the who/what/when, and more. My gut feeling, notwithstanding any apologist and their weak arguments, is that the design choice is exactly about the who/what/when because it's mandatory despite being entirely unnecessary from a technical perspective.
How does it follow that Signal knowing a phone number means they know who the identity that phone number represents is communicating with?
Every Signal account is represented by the phone number the user provided in order to receive their SMS activation code, and messages are not sent directly between users' clients/apps but relayed through Signal's systems.
Your original assertion "signal knows who is talking to whom" does not follow from "Signal relays the data".