Signal is the gold standard for private messaging, and it was never just for whistleblowers, journalists, or anyone making headlines for the wrong reasons. It is for anyone who believes that a private conversation should actually be private. That includes you.
Signal is end-to-end encrypted by default, which means only you and the person you are talking to can read your messages. Not Signal. Not your carrier. Not any government agency sitting on a data request. No one. The app is run by a nonprofit, has no advertising business model, and does not sell your data because there is no data to sell.1
It works for text, voice calls, video calls, and group chats. You can set messages to disappear automatically after a set time. You can use it on your phone and your desktop. And it is free.
While you’re at it, lock down your lock screen.
One of the most overlooked privacy settings on an iPhone is the message preview that shows up on your lock screen. By default, your phone displays the first line of incoming texts even when it is locked, meaning anyone who glances at your screen can read your messages without unlocking anything.2
To fix it: go to Settings > Notifications > Messages and set Show Previews to Never (or When Unlocked if you want a middle ground). Do the same for Signal specifically under Settings > Notifications > Signal. Your lock screen should tell people nothing about who is talking to you or what they are saying.
A few more settings worth turning on.
Inside the Signal app, go to Privacy in settings and enable Screen Lock so Signal requires Face ID or your passcode to open. Turn on Screen Security to prevent Signal from appearing in your app switcher. And consider setting a default disappearing messages timer on all new conversations, so your chat history doesn’t live on a device forever.3
If the people in your life are not on Signal yet, start with one. You only need a phone number to sign up, and once they see how seamless it is, the rest will follow. Privacy is a group project.
Download SignalNotes
1 Signal is operated by the Signal Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. Its protocol is open source and has been independently audited by security researchers. Unlike iMessage or WhatsApp, Signal does not retain metadata about who you message or when.
2 This applies to iMessage, Signal, WhatsApp, and any other messaging app. The lock screen preview setting controls all of them at the system level, though each app also has its own notification settings you can adjust individually.
3 Disappearing messages do not delete content from the other person’s device until their own timer runs out, so this works best when both people in the conversation have it enabled. It is not a guarantee, but it significantly reduces how long your messages sit around waiting to be found.
