Secure, stable and free online communication channels for organizing during pandemic

Submitted by daniel dreveny on April 10, 2020

hi,
do you have any advice regarding safe and stable platform for online meetings? Better if it is user friendly, like for example Jitsi (meet.systemli.org). With Jitsi we experienced issues with connectivity, when there were 6+ people at the same time. Very bad voice quality and someone was always kicked out of the call.
Thanks
Daniel

Spikymike

4 years ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by Spikymike on April 17, 2020

Maybe need to widen this discussion.

As we are all forced to become 'cyber activists' of one kind or another, I think it would be of real benefit if we could start to share best practices in this space.
Whilst I'd be very keen to learn how others are working and organising together at this time I'm also very keen to know eg:
1. which teleconferencing/messaging platforms folk are using (e.g. Zoom, Skype,WhatsApp, Discord,Slack,, twitch...Jitsi) amd why?
2. which are mostt secure (e.g. have end to end encryption and which don't)
3. is e.g. communicating via Twitch over playstation somehow fundamentally more secure than say Zoom via a laptop ? or vice versa?
4. do folk regularly change their IP addresses? Should you? How? Does that fuck everything else up, I dunno, the usual cookies you might have on your computer.
5. are there more/less secure email services like eg proton mail?
6. how do folk best stay anonymous and safe on line?
7. how do you even e.g. donate to libcom anonymously/securely?
8. how do you e.g. register a web domain anonymously/securely?
9. is there a simple activist's guide to all this that I'm missing?

I'm sure some of these questions above make me look rather naive or stupid, but that's kind of my point. I don't know this. And from how I've seen many other activists use tech, they don't know either... so sharing knowledge around this stuff seems of vital importance to me.

I'v posted this on behalf of a friend and comrade but I'm probably even more at a loss with a lot of this than they are so also interested to learn....

R Totale

4 years ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by R Totale on April 17, 2020

This article might be of some use: Our Mutual Aid Efforts Need a Stronger Tech Immune System

I'm not an expert on this stuff, but I do get the impression that there's a strong trade-off between security and convenience/usability, which there's not a simple answer to: the mutual aid groups have been able to take off so successfully because they've been based on facebook and whatsapp that practically everyone has already, you wouldn't get that if they forced everyone who wanted to participate to install Signal or whatever first. At the same time, there are obvious limitations to just using the big corporate platforms.

Spikymike

3 years 8 months ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by Spikymike on August 20, 2020

And the latest reminder here:
https://freedomnews.org.uk/a-note-on-facebooks-crackdown-against-us-anarchist-groups/

R Totale

3 years 8 months ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by R Totale on August 20, 2020

I'm sure there was another resource I meant to share here, can't 100% remember what it was now but maybe it was these:
https://thefinalstrawradio.noblogs.org/post/2020/05/07/digital-security-tools-for-organizing-with-the-cldc/
https://cldc.org/security/

Red Marriott

3 years 8 months ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by Red Marriott on August 22, 2020

Spikymike

And the latest reminder here:
https://freedomnews.org.uk/a-note-on-facebooks-crackdown-against-us-anar...

Depending on how such things develop, maybe another reason for maintaining forums on sites like this?