Now, however, Keybase makes it much easier to get started. You needed to have a GPG key to use it and almost everything was activated on the command line. When it first came out Keybase was decidedly for power users. Now, however, Keybase has a multitude of functions such as messaging, the ability to encrypt and sync documents between devices, and share documents and folders with other users. Keybase started primarily as a method to prove your identity online. Keybase Keybaseįinally, if you’d like something a little on the geeky side and can get your friends to go along with it, then we’d suggest Keybase as an interesting choice. Viber’s end-to-end encryption, like Telegram, is proprietary however, the company says it does use the same basic idea of a ratchet system like Signal.Īs with some other WhatsApp alternatives, Viber offers a desktop app in addition to mobile. Once that’s done Wire assigns you a username prepended with an similar to Twitter. Alternatively, you can sign-up with email. Similar to Signal and WhatsApp, you can use your phone number to sign-up. Wire is a premium end-to-end encrypted messenger (like Signal) that’s brought to you by some of the same people who developed Skype. If you want to get started with Signal we’ve got an article explaining everything you need to know.

Unlike WhatsApp, however, you can customize the amount of time before messages start disappearing. Signal also supports disappearing messages if you use that feature on WhatsApp. You cannot see older messages as you can with WhatsApp. Unlike WhatsApp, however, Signal’s desktop app only shows new messages from the point you started using it (thanks to the strict way it handles encryption and privacy). That said, the service offers a desktop app that achieves similar functionality. One thing Signal does lack is an equivalent to WhatsApp Web for viewing your chats in a web browser on any device.

Viber vs whatsapp 2015