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Meta Shuts Down End-to-End Encryption for Instagram Messaging

https://www.pcmag.com/news/meta-shuts-down-end-to-end-encryption-for-instagram-dms-messaging
33•tcp_handshaker•1h ago

Comments

aucisson_masque•51m ago
> Our messaging system has long been designed to balance user privacy with the ability to respond to scams, harassment, and other safety concerns when users report them or when required by law

TikTok about why they won’t put e2e for private messages.

I guess it’s reasonable to give up privacy to save the children, TikTok cares so much about our kids safety and wellbeing !

2ndorderthought•34m ago
This is awful. They are doing this so they can literally advertise to kids. I bet their dbs aren't encrypted at rest either. Complete foolishnes
chadgpt2•21m ago
Can you steelman TikTok's argument?
milderworkacc•49m ago
I'm not sure if this meets the bar for substantive and thoughtful discussion, but this kind of corporate cowardice, enforced by unelected bureaucrats standing at the bully pulpit is only going to get worse as the noose tightens on the open web.

The combination of hardware attestation and walled garden "app stores" is the end goal of most policymakers in this area, and it happens to suit the monopolists in Google and Apple and Facebook down to the ground.

Perhaps a timely reminder that things do not always get better over time, and that we may have lived past the high point of secure communications in our lifetime.

chadgpt2•7m ago
Do people expect that Instagram can't read their Instagram private messages? I don't think people expect that. And E2EE is not nearly as cheap as the HN crowd likes to pretend—how do those devices get those keys if not through a central service? Especially if one of them is a web browser?
2ndorderthought•35m ago
Instagram should be shut down. Not using encryption for social media and places where users expect any level of privacy is insanity.
chadgpt2•22m ago
Do users expect that Instagram can't read their Instagram chats?
josh-wrale•27m ago
How likely is this about collection of LLM training data?
daft_pink•26m ago
I'm not sure the value of end to end encryption for proprietary application chats. For emails and SMS messages, your messages are being sent between different multiple servers on the open internet and it opens you up to spying, but end to end encryption on instagram is only protecting your chats from Meta.

I find the end to end encryption on Facebook to be detrimental to ease of use, because you always have to use a pin code, etc for the web interface.

If you don't trust meta with your chats, you probably shouldn't be using their application to begin with.

ergocoder•22m ago
Actually, by doing e2e encryption, Meta can say to the authorities that Meta doesn't see any message and cannot be blamed for anything. We cannot snoop user's conversation, and that's generally a good thing.

The authority holds Meta responsible anyway; they don't care about the implementation detail. They want to catch a pedo, and Meta is unable to produce evidence that helps them. Everyone else will yell at Meta for helping pedos.

You can substitute "pedo" with any other heinous crime e.g. terrorism.

And this is how we arrive at the current situation.

Barrin92•11m ago
the entire point of encryption is that you don't trust the channel you communicate through, that's what it was invented for, communication across adversarial channels. Distrust is the only condition under which you need encryption.

In addition from a practical POV it's if anything the reverse is the case. Email encryption is larp security because plain text is the default, leaks metadata and its interfaces make it trivial for people to leak entire conversations. If there's one technology where you should just assume your messages are public, it's email before someone copy pastes or wrongly forwards your encrypted communication to fifty other people.

Private message encryption makes sense because it's now a default, information exchanged is usually personal, and the problem isn't just Meta but law enforcement extorting your data out of their hands, which encryption in the real world has prevented a few times now already.

shiandow•11m ago
I'm not sure I disagree, but I would summarise it slightly differently.

If you don't want Mark Zuckerberg to upload your private messages into his own chat AI, then stop using Instagram immediately.

tylerchilds•7m ago
Put simply:

I’ve talked to Apple engineers.

Siri fell behind due to how good Apple’s privacy is.

Everyone made fun of them for protecting them.

This is exactly the opposite of that, where Mark is throwing you and your children under the bus again because he’s unoriginal and doesn’t know how to make money any other way than by getting all up in your business, statistically.

cyanydeez•5m ago
thats a generous view. The dystopian fascist view is he's aligning with the surveillance state's interests and instagram is seen as a breeding ground for anti-american-american activities.
nothinkjustai•5m ago
Apple feels like the only big tech company that remotely cares about its users. Thank god they make the best computer and OS too.

I’m sure this will not be a popular take on HN however.

Handy-Man•4m ago
They were kinda forced to in the name of "think of the children". The New Mexico case that's been going on at the moment.

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