Why Signal app is better alternative for WhatsApp

Recently, WhatsApp updated their privacy policy and many people started criticizing their policy. Also there were spreading more misinformation about WhatsApp privacy policy. In this controversy, Elon Musk tweeted about Signal app and most of the people started using Signal App. So in this post we are discussing about why Signal app is good alternative for WhatsApp.

Summary of Signal App

Signal private messenger is developed by the Signal Technology Foundation and Signal Messenger LLC. This messenger app initially released in 2014. The Signal Foundation was created by WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton and Moxie Marlinspike who is current CEO of Signal app.

Features of Signal Messenger 

• Open Source

Signal private messenger is completely open source app .That means anyone can see source code of this app. If there is an issue or bug in the app, anyone can fix issues occurred in the app from anywhere. Because of this transparency, you can trust this app much better than any other close source messenger apps like WhatsApp,Facebook,etc.

Here is the source code of Signal app - Source code

• Multi - platform support

Signal private messenger is available on every platform like Android, iOS, Windows, Mac and Linux.

• Security

Like WhatsApp, Signal app also provide end-to-end encryption. Additionally, It also encrypt users files and metadata and store a fully encrypted local backup.Signal app also encrypt group calls.

• Other salient features

1. Incognito Keyboard
2. Delete for everyone
3. @ Mentions in Group Chats
4. Chat Stickers
5. Disappearing messages
6. Screen Security
7. Note to Self

Although,Signal is much better option for the people who are concerned about app privacy.We can't replace WhatsApp easily because it becomes part our daily life and every single person use WhatsApp. But we can slowly switch to other privacy-based apps like Signal.

Also Read - 

How to host website on dark web using Nginx

Root any Android device easily using Magisk

How to host website on Dark Web

    

Dark websites are the websites which cannot be accessed from normal internet.Many people use dark web hosted sites for various purposes like selling illegal goods,anonymity and many other.So how they host such websites on dark web? Well,they host their sites from normal web servers but the servers are well configured for dark web hosting.

Now the main question is can we host our own dark web hosted site? The answer is YES. We can host our website on dark web using our computer or laptop.We are going to host our website using a Linux machine.

What we need?

1) Any linux distro

2) Tor (Most Important)

3) Nginx 

In this post,we are hosting our site on dark web using Nginx server. So let's begin!

Installation -

1) Update packages

        sudo apt-get update

2) Now we need to install important packages

        sudo apt-get install tor nginx

3) Open terminal with root user

        sudo su

4) After this,open torrc file using -

        nano /etc/tor/torrc

5) Scroll down and remove '#' from these 2 lines

    #HiddenServiceDir /var/lib/tor/hidden_service/

    #HiddenServicePort 80 127.0.0.1:80

6) Now save ‘torrc’ file by pressing ‘Ctrl + X’ and press ‘Y’

7) Now start tor service using

        service tor start

    

8) Now go to the hidden_service folder using

        cd /var/lib/tor/hidden_service/

9) Now open ‘hostname’ file using

        cat hostname

10) You will get your dark website address.Now this is your dark website address.Note down this address into text editor or save this address somewhere.

11) Now we need to configure nginx for hosting dark web site.So open 'nginx.conf' file using

        nano /etc/nginx/nginx.conf

12) Now first locate ‘# server_tokens off’ and uncomment this line

13) After this, locate ‘# server_names_hash_bucket_size 64’ and uncomment this line,change bucket size from 64 to 128.

It will look like this -

14) After this,locate ‘# server_name_in_redirect off’ and uncomment this line

15) Now save this file by pressing ‘Ctrl + X’ and press ‘Y’

16) Now create your dark website folder in /var/www/ using-

        mkdir /var/www/tor

you can use any name instead of ‘tor’

17) Now open ‘sites-available’ folder using

        cd /etc/nginx/sites-available

18) Copy ‘default’ file with your dark web folder name.In this case I am using name ‘tor’ so type -

        cp default tor

19) Now open ‘tor’ file

        nano tor

20) Locate these two lines -

        listen 80 default_server;

        listen [::]:80 default_server;

21) Now remove ‘default_server’ from these line.It will look like this-

22) After this,locate ‘root /var/www/html’ and replace ‘html’ with your folder name.In my case it will become ‘root /var/www/tor’

23) Now scroll down and locate ‘server_name’ line and add your dark website address.It will look like this-

24) Now save this file by pressing ‘Ctrl + X’ and press ‘Y’

25) Now type -

        cd .. && cd sites-enabled

and now we enable our site using -

        ln - s ../sites-available/tor

Here ‘tor’ is your dark web folder name

26) Now start nginx server using -

        service nginx start

27) Now put your website html files in /var/www/tor

28) Now open Tor Browser and enter your website address ending with ‘.onion’

Thats it!

If you have any doubts regarding this,leave a comment!