advanced data protection and imessage

[u/[deleted]]

[u/Vast-Total-77]

No it is not more secure. Your iMessages will survive a factory reset if you enabled them in the cloud. They may be harder to get but its existence is still a risk. A privacy oriented person should not want to retain simple data such as “mom can you get orange juice from the store”. Why would this text need to exist more than 30 days?

iMessages in the cloud is tricky when it comes to deleted messages. I’ve seen plenty of messages I deleted from the recently deleted folder reappear after a device restore. Signal is straightforward. Delete app? No messages? Factory reset? No messages.

Signal chats will be gone forever if all parties involved factory reset their device.

Apple can still see you are communicating with the person with all the extra security settings. Signal cannot.

Apple is an ecosystem. Your activities across various things can be linked to your Apple ID. Signal cannot do this.

[u/Accomplished-Ant-540 → u/Vast-Total-77]

thank you!

[u/nate390]

Advanced Data Protection does nothing to iMessage transit, it only affects the Messages in iCloud backups from your own devices. If both you and the remote party have ADP enabled then any backups of iMessages from those devices will be protected more strongly than they would be without ADP.

What you may also be looking for is a separate feature called Contact Key Verification, which allows you to prove you are talking to who you think you are talking to.

[u/Accomplished-Ant-540 → u/nate390]

thank you for the reply

[u/Accomplished-Ant-540 → u/[deleted]]

meta data, meaning my messages location data etc? sorry just trying to learn more

[u/Accomplished-Ant-540 → u/[deleted]]

but they can’t see the actual messages/photos?