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How Signal App Can Win Against Internet Censorship

How Signal App Can Win Against Internet Censorship

Jun Pasaylo

The proliferation on online censorships from dozens of countries around the world has prevented numbers to access limitless sources of information from the internet; countries such as China, Iran, North Korea, Egypt, and United Arab Emirates have successfully blocked a couple of websites in their area and limited the flow of information to government-sponsored sites only. But encryption app Signal discovered ways to fight and win against the online censorship regime.

Open Whisper Systems, developer of the Signal app, discovered the most clever ways to fight against censorship by mirroring traffic and web address request via search engine giant Google. This way, if the government-sponsored censorship tools want to block the request, it has to block the entire Google system. It can also shut down its internet connectivity from the world, isolating the country from the global online community.

The Signal app, which is now available in Google PlayStore, can circumvent from censorship tools, while hiding itself within the encrypted connections of major internet services like Google. In a nutshell, using the Signal app is just like using Google. It turns the search giant into a proxy site for Signal users, while bouncing its traffic to the requesting party and fooling the censors.

Dubbed as domain fronting technique, Signal has already become a favorite tool within the security and cryptography community. Other encryption and anti-censorship tools such as Tor, Psiphon, and Lantern are already using the app.

Moxie Marlinspike, the founder of Open Whisper Systems, said that Signal app showcases a feature that sidesteps censorship in countries like Egypt and UEA after it was blocked days ago. Updating the app, users can regain free access to censored sites. While Signal app is available for Android users only, Marlinspike said that an iOS version will be coming in days ahead.

"It's possible that these countries will respond. But the endgame is that we'll win," said Marlinspike as quoted by Wired.

Watch the video below to know how secure the Signal app is:

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