[0]: https://www.militarytimes.com/flashpoints/2020/01/23/deploye...
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/dec/17/tories-swit...
I am not sure about the situation in the US, but in Europe almost all phone numbers are directly linked to a certain person and address by the provider.
Or "The logo looks cool."
Or "It had 4 stars."
Of "It had lots of good reviews."
You don’t need half as much identification to get stabbed by a weirdo...
Here's a description of how it worked in Telegram before they added a setting to disable it last year: https://medium.com/adamant-im/telegrams-anonymity-hole-how-t...
Once you're on the list of suspects from someone elses Signal chat, you're not going to persuade a suspicious official by bullshitting.
There have been lynchings in India based on this kind of data leaked by WhatsApp which resulted in them finally allowing joining groups anonymously.
One of the points which, yes, I agree with, but I mainly responded to this:
> I can add phone numbers by enumeration into my contacts and Signal will show who among my contacts is on it.\
> I am not sure about the situation in the US, but in Europe almost all phone numbers are directly linked to a certain person and address by the provider.
Or you can go to a corner shop and buy a Lyca or Lebara SIM with cash. No need to give them your address. You can buy top ups in cash as well. At least in Western Europe this is available everywhere, pretty much.
(I'd still prefer if Signal didn't require phone number to sign up though.)
It definitely needs to be more reliable, though. The last time I tried to call someone with Signal instead of just using it for messaging, I got a ringing indication but they heard nothing and then after a few seconds the call showed up as missed, and the same happened the other way around with them calling me. There seem to have been about 500 updates to the iOS app in the past 5 minutes via the app store, though, so many whatever caused that was a short-lived glitch.
This is not legal in Norway.
Not a joke, for real.
They are experts at getting you to talk to them even if you know this. They are experts at getting you to say things that incriminate you or your friends -- that you or your friends have done nothing wrong (in your opinion/as far as you know) will not protect you.
The only answers you should be rehearsing or thinking of in advance are "I would like a lawyer" and "I would like to remain silent." They are rehearsing how to get you to say incriminating things, a lot. Rehearsing or thinking up any other answers only plays into their strengths. Even knowing this, I've been tricked into talking to them, to my detriment. They are really good at it.
"[...]nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself[...]
> [W]hen a suspect in an interrogation told detectives to “just give me a lawyer dog,” the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled that the suspect was, in fact, asking for a “lawyer dog,” and not invoking his constitutional right to counsel.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/true-crime/wp/2017/11/02...
[1] https://privacyinternational.org/long-read/3018/timeline-sim...
If you're not arrested, you should be able to just leave the interrogation (emphasis on should, of course).
... And just hope there are no records that I've been using it since the days when it was 2 apps,- Red Phone & TextSecure, before becoming Signal.
We made a relationship with one I found through family via estate planning (not his specialty) and land deals (not his specialty).
Now I have a name to say out loud when I interact with police. This has happened twice. The OP is right, they'll do everything they can to get you to talk, but understand that if a police officer is talking to you, they're digging for information to incriminate you. In my case, I was a witness to something, and they cuffed me and made me sit on the curb. No possible way I could've needed to be cuffed and questioned. And that was the approach my lawyer took when he came. Best $100 I ever spent.
If you’re in serious trouble like a murder, financial or computer crime you’ll probably be questioned before you’re arrested. That’s the time to be silent and request a lawyer. You may start out with a 1-800 lawyer who will come and tell you to keep quiet. Later you can find a new one if needed.
> Not a joke, for real.
Obligatory link to the fantastic "Don't Talk to the Police" lecture from the Regent University School of Law.
Watch the whole thing:
Off the top of my head, I think it was easier in France (although this was 16 years ago), Iceland, UK. I also recall it being easy in Aus/NZ. Fairly easy in the US as well, I believe, but as I'm a resident, I don't think too much about what address to use when having a prepaid SIM shipped to me, nor do I ever expect to have to show my papers for something like this. (although, of course, a postpaid account usually involves a credit inquiry, so ID docs would be used privately, not for government reasons, for what that's worth).
Which is still a stable identifier that other people know you by, so you will likely keep it a long time and amass a trail of location data. Also its trivial to tie to the IMEI, so if you actually want to change nyms you have to buy a new phone as well.
Everything about the legacy phone system is a liability. Contact discovery is difficult, but tying into phone numbers should be optional and only for the duration of setting up a contact. Using phone numbers for long-lived identifiers is insane.
(fair warning, this will autoplay the word 'Fuck' in the first 10 seconds)
1. Sharing videos/pictures/memes is terrible in an SMS group chat 2. One person in the group has bad cell service, so we needed something that would send messages over Wifi 3. Half the people are on Android, so no iMessage 4. 1/4 of the people aren't on Facebook, so no messenger
I was the one who suggested Signal. I did so because I like the end to end encryption, but that was not a selling point for anyone else. They just cared that it solved the problems above.
Even a last minute lawyer who may not turn out to be ideal is better than no lawyer. A public defender may also be an option in some cases.
When you say the 'magic' legal words "I want a lawyer", they should not talk to you anymore until you have one. In most cases, you are or will be at home with plenty of time to find a lawyer. In some cases you may find yourself detained/arrested ("Am I being detained? Am I free to go?" are other 'magic' words). They may try to tell you that if you would only talk to them, they would let you go -- they are VERY LIKELY lying.
Do not trust that you can tell or sense if they are lying or not. They are experts at tricking you, they are trained and have lots of practice in it. They are legally allowed to lie. (In my personal experience, they did lie about exactly this -- they said "if you just talk to us, you can be on your way", I talked to them, I got arrested anyway.).
Getting arrested sucks; talking to the police without a lawyer can make it much much worse.
tldr; no, you don't need a lawyer in advance, you can ALWAYS say "I would like to remain silent, I would like a lawyer", and you always have this right, and they can not talk to you (or use anything from talking to you) without a lawyer once you've said this.
You (or your friends) can go through serious inconvenience and pain, from lengthy and expensive legal battle (during which you may not be allowed to leave the state etc), to conviction and sentance, even if you don't think you've done something wrong. Innocent people and/or people who didn't realize they were breaking a law get convicted all the time.
Talking to the cops will not help your situation. Not even when they say "Look, we may have it wrong, if you just tell us what happened we can get this all cleared up." Not without a lawyer.
Are you sure you're not exaggerating? I've totally seen incidents where cops were only talking to see if they've even found the right person. They lose interest pretty damn quickly when they realize they're talking to the wrong person (even to the point of rejecting extra evidence you might offer yourself). Whereas I'm pretty damn sure in these cases you cause yourself a lot of (short-term maybe, but still) grief if you suddenly go on the defensive and plead the 5th. It unnecessarily makes you look guilty, whereas a couple minutes of talking can make it crystal clear to them you're totally clueless.
I do not believe it is a good idea to speak to police unless they have a clear suspect, motive, evidence, and other indicators they are not fishing for you to be the suspect.
I firmly, firmly, firmly believe short-term hassle and a lawyer's bill are much better than the long-term ramifications of an arrest, even if you are not convicted ultimately.
I agree with some of the other commenters that you really should say the word "want", not "wish" or "would like". You need to be clear and emphatic about having a lawyer present.
"I am happy to help and will do so as soon as my lawyer gets here."
There are others. Do a search for "prepaid legal services". Most of them have similar prices (~$20 a month) and provide similar services (wills, traffic tickets, document review, etc). Like I said, if you get into serious trouble, you will have to pay for a lawyer. This is like insurance. In my opinion, if it helps you avoid saying something stupid to a cop, it's probably worth it.
This is fairly simply implemented in OTR. Rather than signing the message with an asymmetric keypair (as you would with PGP), you sign it with a HMAC. Thus both the sender and recipient could create a valid message from the sender (giving you the property that only the two people in the conversation can be sure what was actually said by the other party, without being able to prove it to a third party cryptographically).
Of course, they can arrest you even if you don't talk to them. It's ultimately up them whether to arrest you, not to you. You don't necessarily get out of getting arrested by not talking to them. (If they say you can get out of getting arrested by talking to them, they can be lying!). But you make it much worse by talking to them.
I spoke to a family friend who quit the police department I was dealing with over ethical concerns. He said that it was pretty standard practice, especially when dealing with a case they had zero suspects on. He said, "they'll bring you in, they'll tell you you failed, and they'll tell you that if you confess, they'll go easy on you because you're so young. It's not the results that matter on a polygraph, it's the answers you give. Don't lie, and don't incriminate yourself."
He was 100% correct. They brought me back to the station, into an interrogation room, and after about an hour of waiting, told me exactly what he said they would.
I lost all respect for law enforcement through that process.