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0 pointsdarklajid11y ago0 comments

We're getting back to the issue of 'usability' though.

My desktop has no phone number, my tablet has no phone number and .. I have multiple phones, which have different phone numbers. I would like to use a single IM account (hey, like with mail. Or xmpp).

TextSecure doesn't allow that. TextSecure is not usable in these scenarios. It's not about "Could TextSecure leak my number", it's more about "The current architecture of TextSecure makes no sense for these use cases and seems to be quite close to WhatsApp et al - even before their agreement".

A telephone number is not an identifier, it's not stable and it's not something you can expect as 'given'. This is a broken system. As 13, the thread starter, mentioned.

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tptacek11y ago

It's not a "broken system". It's one that doesn't work for your particular use case. As Matt Blaze pointed out in his Twitter message and I did here: simplifying "identity" down a phone number sidesteps a complicated security problem that has created flaws in other applications and will continue to do so.

I'm sorry you can't use TextSecure right now; it's the only encrypted messaging system I actually like (though I think you can get by with OTR [but not group OTR!] and GPG). They have to start somewhere, though. And it's far better than they get a simple case right than an ambitious case wrong.

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