A signal to WhatsApp from Signal App

WhatsApp is currently the most popular messaging app with over two billion active monthly users globally, but users have slowly begun flocking to alternative solutions.

This comes more after WhatsApp's recent notification earlier this week directing users to agree to the renewed privacy policy or stop using the service.

WhatsApp popularized the use of end-to-end encryption in day-to-day communications, introducing it as its default for messaging in 2016. To achieve this, WhatsApp partnered with Moxy Marlinspike’s Open Whisper Systems. They are creators of the most reliable form of message encryption widely regarded as the gold standard, the Signal Protocol.  

Now Open Whisper Systems exists as Signal Messenger, LLC, and is part of the Signal Foundation. Unlike WhatsApp, the Signal Foundation is a nonprofit, is not tied to any major tech companies, and can never be acquired by one. The development of the app is supported entirely by grants and donations from Signal users.

The app is available on Android and iOS. Unlike WhatsApp, the Signal Private Messenger app is also available on the iPad, and users can also download and install the Signal app on Windows, Linux and Mac, like WhatsApp.

Signal encrypts everything you could think of, including your profile photo, your voice and video calls, photos, attachments, stickers, and location pins. 

It also doesn’t takes unsecured backups of your messages to any cloud platforms instead, they are stored in an encrypted database on your own phone so only you hold the key. 

No contact sharing or storing on their server, using another privacy-friendly method to match you with your friends.

One of the oldest and most useful feature is making the messages disappear, something that only recently came to WhatsApp. You can set a timer from 10 seconds to a week and messages older than set duration will simply vanish. 

Still why Signal? 

Well, how about having an Incognito Keyboard option that tells your keyboard not to learn from what you type on the app. Screen Security is another setting which will stop any app from looking into your Signal window and check what you’re typing, which is really neat.