Signal and Telegram : Are they the Best Alternatives to WhatsApp?

WhatsApp recently revised its privacy policy, raising concerns given the data sharing with Facebook and its partner companies. Holding the largest messaging service globally, with over 2 billion monthly active users, finding an alternative has been the tabloid talk. Simultaneously, the new privacy policy has undoubtedly caused a lot more people to consider alternatives to WhatsApp.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk's tweet reading "Use Signal" led to a massive number of downloads for the alternative app for WhatsApp. The recent change in WhatsApp's privacy policy has raised security concerns for Users. Following Signal at a ballpark of 10-20 million monthly active users, Telegram downloads have seen a surge in download accounts for 400 Million.

Merely looking at the raw numbers would suggest that WhatsApp is hugely popular and almost omnipresent while Telegram is catching up and Signal appears to have recently entered the million downloads race. Nevertheless, numbers do not often tell you the whole story. Therefore, we have made through an estimate of the three apps' security and features.

We want to start with security first as it is the most debatable and controversial topic among the three messaging services. So, let us begin with WhatsApp’s security model early in this battle against Telegram and Signal.

WhatsApp has its end-to-end encryption working in favour, which guarantees all your data the absolute safety. All your messages, media files and anything else you share are end-to-end encrypted on WhatsApp. That means only you and the recipient are the only people who can read the messages and not even WhatsApp.

Focusing on security, it is noteworthy that WhatsApp practices the end-to-end protocol developed by Open Whisper Systems, that is the name behind Signal messenger. At the same time, that gives Signal a brownie point, as it is open-source, widely peer-reviewed and considered one of the best protocols for implementing end-to-end encryption in messaging platforms.

Another noteworthy point is that though all your information on WhatsApp uses end to end encryption, it does not encrypt backups (Local or Cloud) or encrypt the metadata. Naming it one of the major criticisms of WhatsApp’s security model. However, that is on the back end.

Another issue is with security features on the user-facing side of WhatsApp. WhatsApp extends a built-in app lock feature on both the Android and iOS apps, so you can lock your WhatsApp chats with biometrics. Furthermore, you get support for two-factor authentication on the app, which is excellent for security.

Analysing all the factors, it does an excellent job of ensuring security for its users. That stated, WhatsApp has flagged a couple of significant privacy nightmares, particularly the recent issue with group chats getting listed on Google search. The problem has been fixed; however, it was a hindrance for the messaging app.

Signal till now is the best for security, be it on the user-facing side of the service or the back end. As mentioned before, Signal uses the open-source Signal Protocol to implement end-to-end encryption, making it by far the best for security purposes. Similar to WhatsApp, the end-to-end encryption covers all forms of communication on Signal. While WhatsApp encrypts the data, Signal goes one step further and encrypts the metadata too.

To guard user privacy against all intersections, Signal devised a new method to communicate amidst the sender and the receiver, and it is called Sealed Sender. Fundamentally, with Sealed Sender, no one will be able to know — not even Signal — who is messaging whom, which is impressive.

You can read more about it on their official website. With everything estimated in terms of security and privacy protection, Signal stands head and shoulder above WhatsApp and Telegram, making it the most secure messaging app between the three.

Concerning security, Telegram does offer some protection to its users. However, many headaches go in the way Telegram encrypts your messages and extra information. Foremost, it does support end to end encryption, but it is not enabled by default. To use their E2E encryption, you will have to use its secret chat feature.

These messages are E2E encrypted, which is fine, but daily chats are not, which is an alarming concern. In simple terms, messages are encrypted on your device and decrypted on Telegram’s server. As you can understand, in this method, Telegram has the encryption codes on the server-side and can, in theory, obtain your regular chats.

Telegram states that it controls its message storage and decryption codes so that one would require government orders from various legal systems around the world to obtain any of your data. In fact, the Telegram states that it has shared 0 bytes of data with any third parties or the government.

Clearly, Telegram’s security is not nearly as robust as WhatsApp or Signal Messenger’s.

Let's look at these three apps' features and see which one extends the most perks to its users.

Overall, WhatsApp offers every feature user might require. It supports group chats with up to 256 members, with voice and video call support (group video calls are restricted to 8 users at any time.). What sets it apart is its distinct feature that neither Telegram offers nor Signal. WhatsApp Status also called Stories. Users love this feature, as they can express their thoughts through it. Making it a social media platform, in a sense.

Moving forward, file sharing on WhatsApp limits to 16 MB for photos, videos, and audio files but documents limits up to 100 MB. Sharing a live location with your contacts is one handy feature for users. Meant for general users, it allows seamless backup and restores through cloud services like Google Drive and iCloud absolutely free.

Unlike WhatsApp that provides features required for a user, Telegram is loaded with features. The app offers so numerous features that it is impressive. Comparable to WhatsApp, you get the basics such as chats, group chats and more. However, unlike the group members at 256, Telegram enables up to 200,000 members for groups.

You can edit sent Messages, along with features like message scheduling, sharing uncompressed media, themes, and a lot more with a whopping sharing size limit of 1.5 GB.

Additionally, it extends multiple group-specific features such as bots, votes, quizzes, hashtags, and many more, making group experiences satisfactory. It offers unique features called self-destructing messages, allowing deleting messages sent to a recipient's device forever.

While Signal strikes Telegram and WhatsApp skilfully when it comes to security, it falls short on the features it offers. However, we do not think there's any prominent feature that might deter you from using the app. It has all the features that the other two apps have secure messaging, voice, and video calls. Like self-destructing messages of Telegram, Signal has disappearing messages and a feature to send a one-time viewable image.

The "Note to Self" is one feature that comes handy for users without creating a single-member group. You can write down your ideas and thoughts while messaging. Aside from that, Signal enables users to send voice calls to its servers, so their identity remains hidden from their contacts (Similar to VPN).

All in all, Signal has some of the best privacy features but might fall short for users who want endless customization options, but we accept to see some more additional features to signal in the coming days.

Analysing all three applications, it's relatively straightforward that Signal is highly secure and private. If privacy is top-most on your priorities, Signal is for you. While even WhatsApp guarantees you security, however, with the new privacy policy, we find it extremely difficult to recommend WhatsApp to anyone anymore.

Telegram cannot be considered best in security, but you do get end-to-end encryption limited to secret chats. However, it does offer a boatload of features that are enough to make any group admin drool.

To add up our estimated information, we will suggest going with Telegram if you want more features than the average messenger. Signal if you are looking for the primary messaging and calling features along with a high standard of security. Still, WhatsApp is looking dicier than ever now with the new policy update.