From a tech conversation:
Does WhatsApp (WA) give out info to polices?

The general understanding is that WA don’t give out communications content to police.

They give out communications metadata to police, and the metadata they give out is substantial, since things like group name, description and icon are considered “metadata” by WA, and even contents of your addressbook (and your peer’s addressbooks) are considered metadata.

Advocates of Signal will point out that Signal does not consider “metadata” things like group name, description or contents of your addressbook.

People used to decent services like riseup’s, autistici/inventati’s, nadir’s, sinodminio’s disroot’s or aktivix’s, will always prefer decentralised protocols where any one can set up their own federated server, like delta.chat, xmpp, are best. Ideally hosted by decent collectives.

#whatsapp #signal #xmpp #deltachat #delta.chat #decentCollectives #decentServices #degoogle #NoBigTech