People expect to join servers and have the history available to them to search. E2EE means that history is not available, and all indexing happens client-side, all messages are stored client-side, etc.
I wonder if those terms would be practically nullified in any way if the E2EE is enabled.
Though, maybe they would attempt to implement something like Apple's offline CSAM policing that almost (IIRC?) came to be. There is also the Whatsapp method (albeit for text-based messages) that the app client of the user reporting you will send decrypted messages to Facebook.
That aside, I was only referring to private communications. Moderation in a public server is different, and there should be more visibility for server admins. With that said, Discord has been improving moderation tools, and I'm not sure how trolls can be stopped as long as making (or stealing) an account is easy. Remove that aspect, and half the reason for using Discord is gone.
They are pretty transparent that they want Discord to be a moderated platform to prevent harassment and the like.
I miss the GameSurge IRC and caleague with Mumble days.
> To that end, the protocol is detailed in our whitepaper[0] and open-source library[1]
If the client is proprietary and controlled by the vendor, E2EE is meaningless.
Last I checked, Discord is a proprietary application that updates itself on startup with freshly baked proprietary blobs straight from Discord Inc. They can say all they want about how great the encryption itself is, sure I believe them, but as long as alternative clients are forbidden and Discord's proprietary self-changing software exists on either end, it doesn't matter.
It's end-to-end encrypted, but both ends are wide open for Discord to do what they like. If not them, someone doing a supply chain attack on their frivolously & opaquely updating proprietary clients.
WhatsApp has E2EE, but how do you think they found CSAM on people's devices? Because they control the endpoints.
Also, you should rethink "many parties ... would stand to benefit from widely publicizing any backdoor." A new bugdoor is found in WhatsApp every six months and nobody cares.
Thank you for pointing out the dead post; it's good to know for future reference (and looks like a guardian angel has since revived it :)
Encryption ≠ E2EE.
Except it kinda is. You need new keys for every participant. This is why the true E2E messaging apps have user limits and no history.
> People expect to join servers and have the history available to them to search. E2EE means that history is not available
It's more acceptable to Discord users for video and audio chats to be E2EE because Discord has always offered them as an ephemeral experience: unlike text chats, they never offered audio/video chat history as a feature for users.
That said, it could potentially work for DMs.
I don't feel convinced of this takeaway, at least in the context of being applied across the board.
I help administer a semi-large, public studygroup community that sees its share of trolls and the like joining the channels and causing disruptions (up to and including exposing themselves and masturbating/helicoptering) for shock value, etc.
If anything, I find Discord's moderation tools for server administrators painfully lacking. Discord is not Signal.
I would have liked to see this in some form closer to an assignable privilege to send out/upload E2EE data granularly grantable to server regulars, while new people start out without the privilege.
This press release going into cool technical details in order to tout E2EE and namedropping one of the most reputable consultants in the biz feels a little tonedeaf.
> granularly grantable to server regulars
more sensibly, and of which i would be really receptive to (as a server/guild administrator), granular setting on a per-channel basis.
of course, this sentiment largely takes for granted that there is any open-facing mission on Discord's part to facilitate community moderation; i definitely tend to lean privacy-first in general.