
Ask HN: What are the end to end encrypted desktop messengers? - xstartup
Preferable multi platform. I can&#x27;t believe, it&#x27;s not solved yet.
======
luxpir
Have you not tried searching yourself? There are quite a few.

Bitmessage, Tox, Wire, Matrix. Even Signal offers a desktop app, but it needs
a phone number to register.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_instant_messagin...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_instant_messaging_clients#Secure_messengers)

Perhaps you're referring to the fact that there's no 'standard' solution. This
is the way of things, it seems - network effects weaken as choice increases.

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jerodg
I've used Tox before, worked fine.

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marksamman
Wire ([https://wire.com/](https://wire.com/)) is end-to-end encrypted, based
on Signal protocol. It's open-source and cross-platform with mobile apps. I've
been using it instead of Skype for two years and I don't regret that decision.

~~~
liotier
Looks interesting... But it is not federated, so one will not use it beyond
team communications (which is a good start though)

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hiq
What do you mean by "beyond team communications"?

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liotier
You meet a random person and wish to connect on a chat/presence system - that
is what I mean by "beyond team communications". Acceptability of such a system
for that purpose either requires overwhelming adoption of a single provider
(Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger) or federation (SMS, SMTP, XMPP back when Google
had not yet killed it). Team communications does not suffer that acceptability
requirement because tooling is hierarchically mandated.

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moviuro
Any mail client + any mail provider + GnuPG [0]

* Totally multi platform, even for platforms not yet invented

* Totally robust, though you might want to follow an operational guide for this [1]

[0] [https://www.gnupg.org/](https://www.gnupg.org/)

[1]
[https://gist.github.com/grugq/03167bed45e774551155](https://gist.github.com/grugq/03167bed45e774551155)

~~~
Mediterraneo10
GnuPG however lacks forward security, and that is seen as a downside compared
to alternatives.

~~~
moviuro
Very valid point, thus:

> The primary problem with PGP is that there is no Forward Secrecy. Losing a
> key means that all content encrypted with thatkey is compromised. There are
> two ways of dealing with this:

> create a single master holy grail key and guard it with your life

> create keys frequently and destroy them as soon as they are no longer needed

[0] [https://gist.github.com/grugq/03167bed45e774551155#key-
loss-...](https://gist.github.com/grugq/03167bed45e774551155#key-loss-is-
catastrophic)

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nukeop
Matrix paired with the Riot.im frontend offers the best functionalities. Do
not trust anything with a Facebook label on it, especially Whatsapp.

~~~
sidcool
Why not WhatsApp? Isn't it peer reviewed by Signal?

~~~
Insanity
I've never heard of it being peer reviewed by Signal. And even if it is,
there's a lot of stuff around Whatsapp apart from the protocol that most
likely is not.

~~~
sidcool
It was Open Whisper Systems. My bad.

~~~
Insanity
They're the people behind Signal, kind of assumed you meant them :-)

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y0ghur7_xxx
Any xmpp client that supports OTR. I like psi+ ([https://psi-
plus.com/](https://psi-plus.com/)), but there are many.

You can pair it with conversations on android
([https://f-droid.org/packages/eu.siacs.conversations/](https://f-droid.org/packages/eu.siacs.conversations/)).

~~~
upofadown
OMEMO[1] seems to be the new hotness for end to end XMPP encryption. The
feature is that it is better integrated than OTR and tends to be easier to
use.

[1] [https://omemo.top/](https://omemo.top/)

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marcc
Keybase has good messaging functionality built it.

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hprotagonist
keybase and signal are my favorites; imessage, whatsapp, and some others also
have native clients.

signal and whatsapp’s “native clients” are chromium-driven, but can run
independently of the browser.

~~~
narrowtux
WhatsApp's "native" "client" is abusing your phone as a server. No-go IMHO

~~~
hprotagonist
this is true for Signal as well, but I think this is a design feature: your
phone becomes a 2FA token.

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wafflesraccoon
Do people still like Telegram? Personally, I love it but every time it comes
up people question the quality of the encryption.

~~~
acct1771
Am working on converting my people to Riot.IM/Matrix.org. Pretty user-
friendly, considering they're alpha or beta, and their attention to their
cryptography.

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bobbyd3
Pidgin/Adium + OTR works well for many of my use cases. The Signal Desktop
client also works well for me.

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stockground
Does anyone have any suggestions for the following?

* Simple for family members to download and use?

* Opensource (server & client)

* Available on Linux, Windows, iOS and Android

Riot/matrix seems like a great match, but I worry that family members will be
unable to use it easily.

~~~
y0ghur7_xxx
> * Simple for family members to download and use?

psi [https://psi-im.org/](https://psi-im.org/)

> * Opensource (server & client)

Can install your own prosody instance or use one of the many free xmpp servers
avalable.

> * Available on Linux, Windows, iOS and Android

I don't know about iOS, but on Android Conversations is excellent:
[https://f-droid.org/packages/eu.siacs.conversations/](https://f-droid.org/packages/eu.siacs.conversations/)
and
[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=eu.siacs.conve...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=eu.siacs.conversations)

~~~
stockground
This looks like it might solve my problem. Thank you for the suggestion, I'll
be looking into this!

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ipratikpatel
Wickr is a great option. they have Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS and Android apps.
They also have a pro app that can do end to end encrypted voice and video
calling with forward secrecy. the best part is message timers that cause
remote destruction of messages.
[https://www.wickr.com/](https://www.wickr.com/)

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fencepost
Would Threema be an option? Gets occasional discussion here. Open source web
client: [https://github.com/threema-ch/threema-
web/](https://github.com/threema-ch/threema-web/)

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xen2xen1
Might be slightly off topic, but have you used Clatter from the Windows Store?
Logs into 10 or 15 web clients at once. URLs can be added. Looks to be
encapsulated edge, but highly useful.

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ipratikpatel
Wickr is great, they have Mac, Windows as well as a few Linus Distro versions.

[https://www.wickr.com/](https://www.wickr.com/)

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jedanbik
Cryptocat - not sure how that project is going these days, but here are some
links:

[https://github.com/cryptocat/cryptocat](https://github.com/cryptocat/cryptocat)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptocat](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptocat)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadim_Kobeissi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadim_Kobeissi)

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donvorged
[https://www.peerio.com/](https://www.peerio.com/)

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airza
Signal desktop solves this problem

~~~
majewsky
Only if you have a phone AFAIK.

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Spooky23
Best human usable solution is iMessage.

Any mail client with either PGP or SMIME.

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the_solenoid
iOS/MacOS Messages/iChat is end to end as far as I know. I know it's not
strictly multiplatform, but just putting it out there.

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kjullien
None mentions telegram secret chats ?

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literallycancer
Telegram has security issues, see older threads.

~~~
acct1771
As far as I'm aware, POTENTIAL security issues. No one's busted it and shown
proof.

I still don't trust their encryption when compared to Matrix.

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aarpmcgee
keybase

