Signal, the popular encrypted messaging program, stopped working in China on Tuesday, according to various reports. According to the app, the app is still available in the Apple App Store in China Reuters, but it is not clear how much longer it can take.
The Chinese government has not made any announcement that Signal will be blocked or banned in China Signal’s website was not available start in the country Monday. Google Play Play S.tore is not available in China, but Android users were previously able to download the app directly from Signal’s website.
Signal did not immediately respond to questions sent early Tuesday.
Signal verification codes for Signal are not currently working in China, according to users discussing the outage Twitter, which would make new sign-ups for the service impossible for anyone using a phone number in mainland China. Some users were still able to access signal if they A virtual private network turned on.
Reportedly, signal still working in Hong Kong, a region that was largely autonomous of the Chinese government before a repression in recent months has largely destroyed the “one country, two systems” approach to government.
According to China, more than 500,000 Signal downloaded on iOS TechCrunch, although it is a relatively humble number in a country with 1.4 billion people. But the growth of Signal was probably for Chinese authorities trying to monitor and control everything that is done on the mainland of China. The end-to-end encryption of Signal would have been very difficult to monitor communication between two people on the app.
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Signal was developed by Open Whisper Systems and have a lot of baggage since ties with the American Intelligence Community. But that origin story make alone this somewhat surprising His was allowed in the first place within China. WeChat, which is not end-to-end encrypted, is by far the most popular messaging program in China.