Amid Apple's FBI Fight, App Developers Are Ramping Up Encryption

[Purveyor]

While Apple fights the demands of the FBI over encrypted iPhone data, the companies that help users communicate privately between such devices are working hard to dramatically increase their methods of security.

Wire, a messaging app backed by Skype co-founder Janus Friis, is the latest to add end-to-end encryption and secure video communication to its service, the company announced today, as it tries to gain traction against rival communications platforms.

The service, which rolled out in December 2014, has tried to distinguish itself with a sleek, uncluttered design and its ability to operate on any device, desktop to mobile, and across all major operating systems.

But Wire has so far lagged far behind competing messaging services in attracting active users. WhatsApp has 1 billion active monthly users, Kik has 200 million, and Telegram recently hit its 100 million milestone. Snapchat claims 100 million active daily users. While Wire does not report its monthly user figures, Friis, who serves as Wire’s executive chairman, said in an interview that new user sign-ups were running at about 150,000 to 200,000 per month.

Offering video calls and end-to-end encryption, both already available on other messaging platforms, is one way to narrow that gap, although Friis said Wire was not adding them just to keep up with the competition. "Video calls have been the top requested feature from our users," Friis said. "It is also something that takes quite a lot of engineering effort to get right across many platforms."

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-10/amid-apple-s-fbi-fight-app-developers-are-ramping-up-encryption

[cprise]

1. Wire is still proprietary, like Skype.

They can use open source crypto till the cows come home, but if the user interface is all "secret sauce" then there's no telling what the company may be compelled to do to compromise your security in the future.

Signal and Ring are a proper open source applications (as are others which specialize in text).

At this point, Ring looks like the more interesting of the two: It isn't attached at the hip to a bulky browser framework, and doesn't leave PC clients as second-class citizens (can you image if Skype did that? It would be "Skype what?&quot .

[bemildred]

2. Yeah, the desperate struggle for screen space.

Sometimes you can't tell if the screen is broken or you just jiggled the touchpad or something, all the little things jumping in an out to try to grab your attention.

I have always preferred wire. It stays unplugged.