An official FBI document dated January 2021, obtained by the American association "Property of People" through the Freedom of Information Act.
This document summarizes the possibilities for legal access to data from nine instant messaging services: iMessage, Line, Signal, Telegram, Threema, Viber, WeChat, WhatsApp and Wickr. For each software, different judicial methods are explored, such as subpoena, search warrant, active collection of communications metadata ("Pen Register") or connection data retention law ("18 USC§2703"). Here, in essence, is the information the FBI says it can retrieve:
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Apple iMessage: basic subscriber data; in the case of an iPhone user, investigators may be able to get their hands on message content if the user uses iCloud to synchronize iMessage messages or to back up data on their phone.
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Line: account data (image, username, e-mail address, phone number, Line ID, creation date, usage data, etc.); if the user has not activated end-to-end encryption, investigators can retrieve the texts of exchanges over a seven-day period, but not other data (audio, video, images, location).
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Signal: date and time of account creation and date of last connection.
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Telegram: IP address and phone number for investigations into confirmed terrorists, otherwise nothing.
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Threema: cryptographic fingerprint of phone number and e-mail address, push service tokens if used, public key, account creation date, last connection date.
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Viber: account data and IP address used to create the account; investigators can also access message history (date, time, source, destination).
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WeChat: basic data such as name, phone number, e-mail and IP address, but only for non-Chinese users.
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WhatsApp: the targeted person's basic data, address book and contacts who have the targeted person in their address book; it is possible to collect message metadata in real time ("Pen Register"); message content can be retrieved via iCloud backups.
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Wickr: Date and time of account creation, types of terminal on which the application is installed, date of last connection, number of messages exchanged, external identifiers associated with the account (e-mail addresses, telephone numbers), avatar image, data linked to adding or deleting.
TL;DR Signal is the messaging system that provides the least information to investigators.
Telegram seem to provide the least info, not signal.
But Telegram also have access to more info about its users, considering that messages are not end to end encrypted by default, than Signal does of its. This means that Telegram can share any data it wants, its users are just hoping that it won't. In the case of Signal, they don't have access to any meaningful data in the first place. Also leaving these here:
https://www.wired.com/story/the-kremlin-has-entered-the-chat/
https://tech.hindustantimes.com/tech/news/russian-court-directs-telegram-to-share-encryption-keys-to-access-users-messaging-data-story-1ZhjHvyTQJ89RhhNnp4bGL.html
That's true. More info means more risk for more data sharing.
How are IP address and phone number less info than dates and times? Unless you're talking file size and Signal is using full timestamps, but that doesn't seem very important here. I highly doubt the limitation that it's only for confirmed terrorist investigations is used sparingly.
Sure that is something debatable. It's just that if we take these information on face value, providing information just for "confirmed terrorists" could be considered lesser of the them. But if you take that out of the equation Signal provides less
I thought that at first too based on the icons, but if you read the text it reveals Telegram has the ability to provide IP address (if they can be convinced to).
As long as your not a terrorist. 😈
Define terrorist.
That's a real issue. But still that makes a condition for data sharing.
"confirmed"