Hector Martin

Unless you want to input your password for every single message you view, the key has to be in memory while you use the app, at which point any other process can grab it.

'Chunks' can mean 'your last 5 days of messages'. Scrolling further would require a retype. But even if it is kept in memory, it's still good against device theft.

We already have FDE to protect against device theft. Doing it in the app would require you to log in on every boot. It makes a lot more sense to have FDE for the whole system rather than each app implementing its own thing.

The FDE is 1. optional 2. a single 'gate'. Are you saying (and I don't mean this to be a strawman) that everything on q device should be protected by a single password? In my payment app I have a PIN, in addition to my device unlock pattern. It does add security

Credential minimization is desirable and good security practice, otherwise users just write them down. Sure, if you *really* want an app-level PIN every time you switch to an app you can implement that with crypto, but *nobody* wants that for a messaging app.

I write down my passwords.. encrypted.. in a password manager.. I sure as hell don't want anything sensitive stored in plaintext on my hdd even if the hdd is encrypted!

Which is fine, *if* you type in your password every time you use it. Which is not what most people want with an IM app. If you just keep the password manager active forever without requiring master password re-entry, the net benefit of its encryption is ~zero.

What's the target demographic for Signal? People who don't care about security? Why would they even use it in the first place? If it shits on security, it fails at being useful.