It packetises and encrypts chats, using email(SMTP) as the transport medium.
Sends downsampled pics, videos or push-to-talk audio by default. Can send full quality pics, videos, or attachments too, as a file.
Integrates with Jitsi Meet to connect video-calls.
It’s available on F-Droid, and you can use a seperate free-email-address(100MB limit) for the SMTP backend (from https://nine.testrun.org/ ), or use your own existing email address.
Cool concept but really sucks if you’re the only recipient using DeltaChat. Plus it comes with all the privacy drawbacks of email. And I get tons and tons of spam so anything I actually care about is quickly buried.
Do note, because it’s using email, the recipient and sender are not private, along with the time, and probably the relative size of the messages.
The specific content of each message should be private as long as the encryption is done well. I haven’t looked at it so I don’t know if it implemnts safeguards to verify who you’re messaging with (besides using the email address) and I don’t know if it uses PFS (Perfect Forward Secrecy) to protect against a key getting compromised.
No, you get spam because the email protocol doesn’t stop spam. You could create a new email address but then you have to give that to everyone who might not appreciate yet another contact method they have to remember for you.
I could be wrong but I’m pretty sure DeltaChat uses PGP, which leaks all of your metadata to your email provider, ISP, and governments. It isnt private but is secure.
These days the best thing you can do is use Signal.
Yes it uses your phone number. You now have the option to use a username though.
Personally, while I totally understand the criticism, this is not an attack vector I am concerned with. I want a private messenger that hides the content and metadata of my messages from ad companies, spying neighbors, and the government. Signal does all of this.
DeltaChat.
It packetises and encrypts chats, using email(SMTP) as the transport medium. Sends downsampled pics, videos or push-to-talk audio by default. Can send full quality pics, videos, or attachments too, as a file.
Integrates with Jitsi Meet to connect video-calls.
It’s available on F-Droid, and you can use a seperate free-email-address(100MB limit) for the SMTP backend (from https://nine.testrun.org/ ), or use your own existing email address.
Elegant and robust.
Cool concept but really sucks if you’re the only recipient using DeltaChat. Plus it comes with all the privacy drawbacks of email. And I get tons and tons of spam so anything I actually care about is quickly buried.
No spam, because it is a family group for sharing non-public pictures etc.
You’d only get spam if you invited a spammer to chat.
The privacy comes from the E2EE.
Do note, because it’s using email, the recipient and sender are not private, along with the time, and probably the relative size of the messages.
The specific content of each message should be private as long as the encryption is done well. I haven’t looked at it so I don’t know if it implemnts safeguards to verify who you’re messaging with (besides using the email address) and I don’t know if it uses PFS (Perfect Forward Secrecy) to protect against a key getting compromised.
No, you get spam because the email protocol doesn’t stop spam. You could create a new email address but then you have to give that to everyone who might not appreciate yet another contact method they have to remember for you.
I could be wrong but I’m pretty sure DeltaChat uses PGP, which leaks all of your metadata to your email provider, ISP, and governments. It isnt private but is secure.
These days the best thing you can do is use Signal.
I haven’t used Signal.
Is your ‘registered Signal number’ your phone handset number?
From this page:
https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007318691-Register-a-phone-number
[You are right, Delta Chat uses AutoCrypt, which is OpenPGP based.]
Yes it uses your phone number. You now have the option to use a username though.
Personally, while I totally understand the criticism, this is not an attack vector I am concerned with. I want a private messenger that hides the content and metadata of my messages from ad companies, spying neighbors, and the government. Signal does all of this.
I mainly want personal family photos away from long corporate data retention (and possible leaks) and away from AI scrapers.
Delta Chat covers this.
I’ll check out Signal again though, thanks for the recommendation.
Really cool! An interesting concept well executed. Sadly has the same problem every new messenger has - barely any users.
But that’s hardly their fault.