Post #1229234
2026-04-14 20:30 UTC
@jaz @benpate In the interviews I've done with Fediverse users about bringing their personal connections, family and friends, to the Fediverse, they repeated again and again that they needed to have private messaging to do that, and this warning keeps them from doing it. If people don't connect with real-world relationships here, they aren't going to stay. This is existential.
Replies (1)
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@jaz@toot.wales 2026-04-14 20:46
@evan @benpate well, that warning would be more informative - but less readable - if it said "Direct messages on Mastodon, just like Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn and all your SMS messages, are not end-to-end encrypted. Do not share any highly-sensitive information over social media." The gap here is people think the others /are/ private because they don't take the ethical stance of pointing this out. Personally, I'd remove the warning.