[lxgr]

To be fair, there is one aspect where the platform is trusted with services like Signal and WhatsApp: Identity to phone number binding.

Many people don't actually ever verify their contacts' keys, but rather just rely on the platform provider to have done phone number verification correctly. In that sense, the security model is bit better than TOFU in practice.

> I'm not a distrustful or cynical person by nature, but I find it hard to avoid the impression that they intentionally made it as hard as possible.

There I fully agree. If anyone could find a way, it's the company running the largest messaging infrastructure in the world.