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by notheguyouthink 3193 days ago
> Two veteran entrepreneurs are running a little startup built around making it easy to build web and mobile applications from day one that make data impossible for a digital trespasser to read. In fact, it encrypts data in such a way that even if you use some company’s service, that company can’t see what you’re doing with it.

Is it? Not that I'm questioning Keybase, I just had no idea they were offering some type of encryption-as-a-service thing. I thought key base offered encrypted identity management, along with some encryption focused tools (kbfs, and now chat). Of course, I don't know/use key base - hence why I'm asking.

Can anyone go into more detail on how key base is offering this service:

> In fact, it encrypts data in such a way that even if you use some company’s service, that company can’t see what you’re doing with it.

(Assuming "some company's service" is a 3rd party service)
2 comments
fapjacks 3193 days ago
Well, kbfs is end-to-end encrypted, versus something like Dropbox (for example), which is only encrypted in transit, and unencrypted at rest. And of course, you have to trust Dropbox when they say employees don't have access to your storage unless they have a good reason. But there's nothing you can do to prevent Dropbox employees (or a government, or someone that has unauthorized access) from deciding there's a good reason to access your data, because it's not encrypted end-to-end like kbfs [0].

[0] https://github.com/keybase/kbfs

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gglitch 3193 days ago
I'm new with it myself, but I think part of what's being described is the option you have, when you have a Keybase account and the Keybase browser plugin and you're logged into a third party system (such as Fbook), of clicking on a Keybase icon for a given user and sending an e2e encrypted message from your Keybase account to theirs (even where they don't have one yet--if they make one later and associate it with their account on the third-party service, they will then unlock access to the message).
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notheguyouthink 3193 days ago
Ah hah, this seems to be the answer then. Thanks!

I like that idea of encoding before it hits FB/etc. Though, the level of security provided by a browser plugin makes me a bit nervous. Not an educated nervousness mind you.. I just tend to not trust them, and how well sandboxed they are, etc. It's the reason I also don't use browser plugins for password management.

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