About Threema: Anyone using it? Is it as safe as they say?

Eagle_Owl

Blastoidea
Sorry! Right, I forgot: in this forum here personal messages are not possible like in some other forums.

I did this in the public community of another messenger, Session: there is a community for discussing ‘instant messaging devices and protocols’.

xuid0

I'm a fan of Molly (using Signal) so that I can log in on two pixel devices attached to one Signal account. The default Signal which is found on Signal.org does not achieve this. Also the other encryption options are a nice touch to have as well like an app lock that encrypts at rest properly.

I recommend https://molly.im I guess everyone's Threat Models are different though.

xuid0

HomerJay

Gee I hope Threema (the host of app) never does an Elon Musk. As in turns into a malicious host. It is my understanding they would have a lot of access so to speak (in theory).

dokmaistr

xuid0 It's designed to collect as little meta data as possible, traffic is encrypted and you don't even need to provide a phone number or email. What makes you think they have a lot of access to data?

dokmaistr

thure true, looking at the battery usage I also see that Threema is more efficient than Signal.

Eagle_Owl

dokmaistr
No, it is not more efficient if your configuration is efficient:
Signal and Molly doesn't need “Unrestricted battery use” for background usage.
If you understand this and give it a try, then you will see the difference!

Murcielago

dokmaistr

Same here - the exact values differ but the result is similar:
Looking at my setup long-term view Threema seems to consume less battery than Signal although I use Threema more than Signal.

My setup:
Both apps run in a profile without Google services.
GrapheneOS build 2024123000

Threema (version 5.6.0):
Allow background usage: on
App battery usage: unrestricted

Signal (version 7.28.4):
Allow background usage: on
App battery usage: optimized

dokmaistr

Eagle_Owl Thanks for your suggestion but I don't see this behavior. I have Signal with restriced battery usage, Threema with unrestricted battery usage: Signal 13% vs. Threema 4%, see https://nowtransfer.de/2ef5fc4a6313
I can't judge if restricted battery usage for Signal had any impact/delay since I did not receive many messages for Signal (referring to comment: "Notifications may not work properly if any power saving mode is enabled, or if power usage is managed in the background.", source https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/8170803067546-Pixel-Notifications).

Xarcell

I considered Threema and even paid for it. I found out later that not all of it's code is open source, only part of it, therefore not open to a complete audit. Session recently moved to Switzerland and is now protected by swiss laws just like Proton. I switched to GrapheneOS months ago, but cannot get my friends and family to use anything other than Facebook Messenger, which I absolutely refuse to use and haven't used since it first came out. SMS text is the only thing I'm using at the moment.

that_guy

Xarcell I considered Threema and even paid for it. I found out later that not all of it's code is open source, only part of it, therefore not open to a complete audit.

Are you referring to the server code? It's not open source but even if it was, how does one guarantee that it's actually the code running on the server at any given time?

The apps are open source, audited by cybersecurity companies like Cure53 and have reproducible builds. This is the way I understand it, anyway. I'm open to (gentle) correction if I'm wrong.

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