How To Use Signal To Exchange Messages Safely

The Signal is one of the most secure encoded informing applications: here are hints and deceives for utilizing it without limit. If you have any desire to safeguard your discussions, Signal is a finished informing application that protects your Protection. The application depends on start-to-finish encryption, as do other applications like iMessage, WhatsApp, and Telegram. Nonetheless, Signal offers clients many more elements. However, most importantly, being an open-source application, the designers have had the chance to develop it further and make it much safer.

Nonetheless, this application also has limits: assuming it is utilized to send messages to contacts who don’t use Signal, your discussions won’t be encoded. The encryption innovation works for interchanges from the two sides through the application. Also, when using the app for its desktop version, remember that security is not always guaranteed if you are not careful and that the more devices you use, the greater the risk of your messages being spied on or stolen. Therefore, you can follow some tips and tricks to make the most of all the functions offered by Signal encryption, which we now propose to you.

Table of Contents

Signal, How To Download It And Start Using It

The Signal app is available for Android devices on the Google Play Store and for iOS devices in the App Store. Once downloaded, it will be sufficient to open it and register by providing your phone number, on which you will receive a text message with an activation code to be entered into the app. For added security, the user can choose to activate Signal using a Google Voice number if they have one. The procedure is this: when you first open Signal, you will be asked to log in or activate the phone number. To use Google Voice, you must click on Register and follow the instructions until the SMS verification code is sent. After receiving the code, enter it in the Google Voice app, and the generated number will, in turn, be the activation code of the encrypted messaging app.

Find Contacts Who Use Signal

After installing and configuring Signal, you can search for who among your contacts is already using the app, which in any case, sends you a notification when one of the contacts in the address book signs up. Suppose you do not want to receive these types of updates. In that case, you can disable them by tapping the Profile icon, selecting Settings, going to Notifications, and then disabling the item ” When a contact joins Signal. “

Set Signal As The Default App For Your Messages

If you want to use Signal and ensure your Privacy, you can set it as the default app for your Android device. To do this, go to Settings, then to Apps and notifications, scroll to Advanced, select Default apps, then SMS app, and finally, choose the Signal app. All your messages will be sent and received via the app. The feature is currently unavailable for iOS devices, as it is impossible to set a default app other than iMessages on the iPhone. To change the default apps, iPhone users will have to wait for the arrival of the iOS 14 operating system.

Use A PIN To Protect Your Conversations

Another highly appreciated feature of Signal for preserving your Privacy is using a PIN associated with your Profile. Each time you open the app, you will need to enter your PIN, which will be required to keep the information you use on the messaging app encrypted. In addition, the PIN can also be used for Registration Lock: every time you download the app and install it, you will need to enter it to re-register your associated phone number.

Notifications Don’t Show Text

When you receive a message that you want to be kept private, the sender’s name and the Message’s content mustn’t appear in the notification pop-ups. To keep your conversations always safe from prying eyes, you can set the notification information to be shown on display directly in Signal. Going to Settings, then to Notifications, you will find the item Show, and you can choose between the options Name and Message, Only name, or Neither name nor Message.

Encrypted Calls And Video Calls

Signal encrypts written conversations, and your calls and video calls are also encrypted (if made through the app). To activate call encryption on Signal, tap the pencil icon within the app, as you would start a chat, choose a contact, click on the phone or video icon in the top right corner and start your call.

Disable Screenshots In The App

One of Signal’s most popular features is the inability to take screenshots of your conversations. If you are using the encrypted messaging app, you can set the Screen Security option, which prevents taking screenshots both in the recent apps list and in the app itself. To activate this option go to Profile, Settings, select Privacy, and activate Screen Security.

Lock Screen Like In Android

Another handy feature of Signal is the ability to insert a Screen Lock, just like the lock screen of Android and iOS devices. Whether it’s a PIN, a password, a pattern, the fingerprint, or the FaceID of the iPhone, the security system used to unlock your phone when you wake it up from standby will be the same to use to access your conversations. Insecurity. To activate it, go to Settings, then Privacy, and select Screen Lock. The app also allows defining an inactivity time to set the screen lock and automatically protect your Privacy.

Use Pop-Up Messages

Even if by manually deleting your conversations, they will be safe and impossible to trace, Signal offers the possibility to send a ” Disappearing Message. ” This element permits you to set a clock, after which the messages in the discussion will vanish. By selecting the option, you can choose between different time intervals ranging from a few seconds up to minutes, hours, days, and a maximum of one week. To activate the disappearing messages, open a single conversation with your contact, tap the three dots at the top right, select the option, and set the desired time.

Photos And Videos Remain In The App

When you take a photo via WhatsApp or shoot a video to send to friends, you will see the images automatically saved in your Gallery. Signal instead keeps photos and videos inside the app, leaving no trace of what you share. If you want to keep the image or video you sent, you can manually save it from time to time. In addition, you can choose how many times the content can be viewed on the recipient’s phone: it goes from ” infinite, “that is, each time the chat is opened, to ” 1x “, that is, the photo or video is automatically deleted after the first view. The discussion will keep track of an image that has been shared, but you won’t be able to know which one. Another handy function then allows you to automatically blur faces in photos, to be used by simply pressing a button. Otherwise, you can manually blur the details of the image you don’t want to share with the recipient.

Block Unwanted Contacts

To close conversations with unwanted contacts, block them, just like WhatsApp. To do this, go to the contact’s name in the chat, and activate the option Block this user. When you want to unblock, a connection goes to Profile, then to Settings, select Privacy and open the list of Blocked contacts. A pop-up will open by holding down the name, allowing you to unblock the contact.

Keyboard In Disguise

Often the third-party apps we download for keyboards with a more comfortable layout can record what we type and keep our information. Signal has introduced a particular function called incognito keyboard to prevent this. By activating this app from the Privacy section of your user profile, keyboards will not be able to keep track of when you have typed.

Message Requests Block Those You Don’t Know

The new function introduced recently allows you to select who can send us messages. When we receive a call or a letter from a Signal user we don’t know for the first time, we can approve or block the new contact without being notified of anything. The Message Request feature is handy, as it prevents strangers from adding you to unwanted group chats, as they do on Facebook Messenger.

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