
Wire Server open sourced - haarts
https://medium.com/@wireapp/wire-server-code-now-100-open-source-the-journey-continues-88e24164309c
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Dowwie
It is worth noting that this venture features an open sourced, Haskell
implementation of a messaging server and Rust implementations of the
underlying secure messaging protocol, Axolotl

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equalunique
Not only that, but the chat & calling actually work well too. Test it out
yourself. My username on there is the same as my username on here.

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newscracker
I haven't used Wire [1] in a long time because it didn't have a way to backup
and restore conversations when switching devices (Signal behaves the same way
too). But I do look at the release notes whenever the client is updated.
Recently I was happy to see that Wire allowed up to three accounts to be
configured in the client!

I also like the fact that Wire doesn't need a phone number (unlike Telegram,
Signal, WhatsApp and similar applications). You can sign up with an email
address and use it. Of course, Wire is end-to-end encrypted, syncs across
devices (unlike Signal) and has native^ multi-platform/multi-OS support where
each device is independent and doesn't need the phone to be around (unlike
Signal or WhatsApp).

On the topic of open sourcing the server, it's a good move from the security
audit point of view. But until any of these new age apps/platforms support
federation and decentralized communication, there's not much use for the
masses to look for servers run by specific people.

^: As mentioned in a comment below, it's an Electron app, but I meant to
indicate that there's an app that you can install for each platform without
having more prerequisites (unlike Signal that requires Chrome/Chromium to be
installed first).

[1]: [https://wire.com](https://wire.com)

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bubblethink
>But until any of these new age apps/platforms support federation and
decentralized communication, there's not much use for the masses to look for
servers run by specific people.

What's the use case for self hosting ? Since it's supposed to be e2e, does
self-hosting buy you anything ?

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Siimteller
It’s a requirement many organizations have - government institutions are a
good example. Some might want to not leak any data to the outside world, run
it only for internal use, etc.

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throwaway2016a
To save people of a few seconds of confusion...

"Wire" is a secure messaging app. When I saw "wire server" I immediately
though "wire protocol" which is a networking term and also something
completely different.

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ailideex
while wire seems better than most alternatives I prefer matrix.org/riot.im -
it is not quite geared at same function but it works just as well for it.

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zeveb
Wire is really, really exciting. I don't know if I trust its crypto anywhere
near as much as I trust Signal's, and I don't know if I trust its business
model as much, but featurewise it seems a _healthy_ competitor.

Multi-device. Email-address-based. Federated [soon]. What's not to like?

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Siimteller
Crypto - Wire’s Proteus is an independent implementation of Axolotl that was
later renamed to Signal Protocol. There’s also an external audit available -
info and links from Wire.com/privacy.

As to business model, Wire is VC funded by Iconical.com /Janus Friis (co-
founder of Skype) and announced the first paid product in July -
wire.com/teams.

Full disclosure: I work at Wire.

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dijit
This is a compelling reason to use Wire over Telegram or whatsapp. I am
assuming we can run our own instances though.

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tptacek
I would hope the sharply better security of Wire or WhatsApp would be a good
reason to use them instead of Telegram.

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woodrowbarlow
there are plenty of factors at play. for example:

i would hope the "not being owned by a datamining advertising giant" of wire
or telegram would be a good reason to use them instead of whatsapp.

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tptacek
If you're worried about supporting Facebook, use Wire. Facebook can't read
WhatsApp messages, which are E2E encrypted (unlike Telegram's default). But
it's a legit concern, and one that Wire addresses nicely.

You should be _extremely_ suspicious of any messaging company that advertises
client-server encryption as a privacy feature. It obviously is not.

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grizzles
If they ship an API + a lowish cost proprietary license I could see them doing
nicely from this. I'd go $100 or $1 per employee, whichever is greater.

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Siimteller
We have the beginnings of an API - Wire.com/developer

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crtasm
Did anyone else end up ditching Wire on android due to an update about two
months ago breaking notification sounds?

They're aware of it but no fix as yet.

