[toastercup]

There are subcultures that are not widely accepted where this is an issue. Take the furry subculture as an example. You might not want your family or college pals to see your furry profile picture and pseudonym, but you also might not be aware of the implications of using a messaging service where the primary ID is your phone number. Many people hand out their phone numbers permissively, as historically, they weren't very "personal" on their own - save for identifying your real name. For many people, having/juggling multiple phone numbers to maintain distinct identities is beyond their technical expertise and simply won't happen in most cases (especially on Telegram, where VOIP numbers are prohibited).

I don't know precisely how Signal does things, but I know this can be an issue on Telegram - and I assume they work similarly. I can see a lot of reasons folks might not be fans of phone-number-as-ID, especially when it alerts folks that you've joined, or gives folks who merely possess your phone number an easy way of viewing your profile details.

I think the first quality E2EE messaging service that provides users an alternative to phone-as-ID could give Telegram/Signal (not that the former is necessarily E2EE) a serious run for their money among privacy-conscious users and members of fringe communities.

[XorNot]

Signal doesn't advertise a profile. It advertises a phone number - everything else is data you have locally. It will send a profile picture if you set one but that's it.

[itake]

Does it advertise your username? If I don't have the name of the contact, will Signal share my username or does it just say "this number in your list has joined signal, and here is their profile?"

[athrun]

My understanding is that your profile username is made visible if:

- the person is in your own contact list

- you create a conversation with them

- you accept a conversation from them

see: https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007459591

[toastercup]

Nice. Sounds like the same rules apply to profile pictures as well. That feels like a step in the right direction, but it still means that by having family/coworkers/college buddies/etc in your contacts, they can see your profile picture and username. I know this can be a sticking point for some. It would be great if Signal introduced finer-grained privacy controls so it could appeal to an even wider audience.

[itake]

You can download leaked phone numbers of millions of ppl and add them to your phone's address book (iOS limits contacts to 50k). I don't think this is very secure.

[athrun]

No, that would only allow them to see your name, but you still wouldn't see their names unless they add you.

[jraph]

You also see people's username when they are in the same group conversation as them (and they are not in your contact list).

That's what I observe by using Axolotl on the phone and Signal Desktop on the computer.

[fastball]

> among privacy-conscious users and members of fringe communities

Sure, but this is realistically a tiny group, and development effort is probably better spent making the 99% that don't fall into this category happier rather than prioritizing features needed for the 1%.