I want to make it dead-easy for others to chat with me. I want a browser-based, FLOSS, E2EE chat solution that doesn't require the other party to log in. Does that exist?
from snek_boi@lemmy.ml to privacy@lemmy.ml on 19 Mar 2025 20:15
https://lemmy.ml/post/27412782
from snek_boi@lemmy.ml to privacy@lemmy.ml on 19 Mar 2025 20:15
https://lemmy.ml/post/27412782
Here’s my problem: every F(L)OSS and E2EE solution that I know of requires other people to download an app or log in.
I want to reduce the friction for others to communicate for me. I want to give a business card with a URL where people can go and immediately send messages to my Matrix or my email or something, and they don’t need to log in at all.
They just open their browser, go to snek_boi.io or whatever and a chat appears.
A couple of years ago, I was suggested Cactus Comments. I suppose that works, but I was wondering if there are other solutions. I was wondering if now there was an even easier solution for my purposes.
threaded - newest
The Graphene OS homepage has a Matrix chat page configured like this that automatically generates a guest user
This sounds amazing. It’s unfortunate that Graphene OS has so much toxicity around it, but this design decision is amazing. Love it.
I tried quickly looking for the feature, but I couldn’t find it. I searched for “Graphene OS Matrix chat homepage guest user”, “Graphene OS chat homepage guest user”, “Graphene OS chat homepage”, and “Graphene OS homepage QR” but didn’t find what you mentioned.
Toxicity? How so?
reddit.com/…/whats_your_opinion_on_graphene_os_co…
news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30929526
A quick search lead to these links. They’re 3 years old. Maybe the community has changed since then.
It has. Strangely enough they posted a code of conduct after that feedback and started weilding the ban hammer. However I cannot speak to outside forums like XDA or Reddit or even comms here. I tend to stick to their forums or github
discuss.grapheneos.org/t/general
github.com/GrapheneOS/os-issue-tracker/issues
Oh wow. That’s a pleasantly surprising code of conduct. If the code of conduct is consequential, I stand corrected about my view of Graphene OS.
That matters? Why does developer behavior influence your judgement over whether you will use certain pieces of software? Just curious
You’re bringing up a fair point, similar to “can you separate the art from the artist”? I think it’s possible; I’ve seen mean and disparaging people do amazing work. Heck, at times I’ve been a cranky worker cranking out good work.
However, I also know that toxic people are hard to work with and limit their own potential and that of others. A quick look at the ACT literature, the intrinsic motivation literature, the learned-helplessness literature, and the Lybomirsky et al. meta-analyses from 2008 and 2018 all point to the same idea: psychologically flexible people are happier and that leads to better work and more productivity, but not the other way around.
Matrix config has an option named “guest mode”, that is what I believe they’re using.
Ah. I searched for it and found that guest mode was disabled on Matrix.org’s servers. I wonder if making it work in another server is easy, either with or without GrapheneOS…
it’s so easy to chat with you!
hi
I’m nicole, but you can call me the fediverse chick
<img alt="" src="https://redlemmy.com/pictrs/image/77284765-902a-4b0c-aeef-af4bc172782c.png">
Oh no. What have I done?
Even better that only the first line was visible until I scrolled
Is that a crack pipe
Who is she? Whats up? Is this a ‘how do you do fellow kids’
you could write a SPA (single-page app) with input for email or chat messages, wired up on the backend to make use of your personal API key or account. Just have them fill in boxes for their name. And delegate to the appropriate FOSS service depending on what they pick.
I don’t think this exists on the market, you’d have to write it yourself but it would be pretty easy
chat-e2ee-2.azurewebsites.net
This ticks all the boxes! Thanks! I suppose something I didn’t contemplate is that I would like to close the chat and still be able to get notifications on my phone. I don’t want to always have a dozen chats open, ready for the other party to send me a message. Regardless, I’m glad this project exists!
Idk how to help you, snek boi.
That’s alright 🙂
e2ee is not really compatible with what you want due to necessary key management, and once you drop that there are so many possible options for what you want that I don’t want to list them all here.
Can you expand more on the key management? I thought chat-e2ee-2.azurewebsites.net passes a PSK Through the header and sets that as a cookie in the browser to sign further comms. I could be mistaken of course.
Yes you can juryrig something like that with cookies, but it is highly fragile and browser based e2ee is basically a scam anyways as the server serving the website can always swap out the javascript that decrypts the messages.
Fragility is by design as it’s ephemeral comms. Swapping the js decryption doesn’t make sense as wouldn’t the client just fail or refuse the message stream as the decrypt/encrypt changed? It’s an interesting problem. Thanks for giving me something to noodle on.
The server can swap to a modified JS that exfiltrates the e2ee key and thus allows the server owner to decrypt the messages, or in more advanced encryption schemes add additional keys without you knowing and achieve the same thing.
medium.com/…/how-javascript-works-cryptography-ho…
I still don’t see how
Wouldn’t significantly change the recieved hash and break the stream thus ending comms. Also unless you’re hosting and building it yourself you have to trust the recipient and the cloud host.
I agree if an attacker owns the server comms can be compromised. I thought that was the benefit of the ephemeral nature. It’s for quick relay of information. Best practices would probably include another cypher within the messages themselves like a one time pad or some such.
itstactical.com/…/uncrackable-diy-pencil-and-pape…
github.com/muke1908/chat-e2ee
i’m trying to understand your exact scenario.
but in general, the problem is where do you get your original key, or original hash to verify from? if they are both coming from the server, along with the code which processes them, then if the server is compromised, so are you.
thankfully browsers give alot of crypto API lately (as discussed in your link)
but you still need at minimum a secure key, a hash and trusted code to verify the code the server serves you. there are ofc solutions to this problem, but if the server is unstrusted, you absolutely can’t get it from them, which means you have to get it from somewhere else (that you trust).
I don’t know yet. It’s more a thought experiment than anything else.
github.com/muke1908/chat-e2ee
Looks like the URL is part of the seed and salt which is cool.
Proving who you are is done in another stream. Like MFA.
You do a one time pad, generate the URL with that. Communicate what’s needed, then the URL dies.
I’m still noodling with it.
cool, sounds like you have most of the principles down.
what i didn’t yet see articulated with chat-e2ee is how the actual code itself verifies itself to the user in the browser? it sounds to me like it assumes the server which serves the code is ‘trusted’, while the theoretically different server(s) which transmits the messages can be ‘untrusted’.
I think that’s by design and the nature of the setup. Anyone with the URL can communicate.
If your other comms method is compromised this doesn’t have much use. Which is a different problem all together. I think this would work great as something like a deadrop so two completely faceless people can communicate. I like it a lot.
ah fair enough. i think that was the initial confusion from myself and perhaps the other user in this discussion. i didn’t realise your use cases.
it’s always a fun topic to discuss and got me thinking about some new ideas :)
Right?! This is why I love the Fediverse and FOSS.
Have a good night/day
Hope you find new fun ideas as well!
Checkout https://delta.chat/en/
out of interest, do you actually mean no login, or do you mean no email-verified login?
No login at all. You just open the URL and there’s a text box waiting for you to send a message to me.
So you want a guestbook from 1996?
jitsi?
You mean a “contact form?” They’re everywhere.
Isn’t this asking for trouble with spam, bots etc?
Yes. I suppose I’d like to try it. Maybe the cost is worth the benefits.
Jitsi Meets?
i chat with you on your webpage, but how do i get notification or your replies once i switch off the webpage. there has to be some form of unique identifier of the people you messaging with. idk if that how it works but it seems to make sense no?