3d ago

Mike Waltz accidentally reveals obscure app the government is using to archive Signal messages

www.404media.co

Mike Waltz Accidentally Reveals Obscure App the Government Is Using to Archive Signal Messages

A photograph of Trump administration official Mike Waltz's phone shows him using an unofficial version of Signal designed to archive messages during a cabinet meeting.

Mike Waltz, who was until Thursday U.S. National Security Advisor, has inadvertently revealed he is using an obscure and unofficial version of Signal that is designed to archive messages, raising questions about what classification of information officials are discussing on the app and how that data is being secured, 404 Media has found.

On Thursday Reuters published a photograph of Waltz checking his mobile phone during a cabinet meeting held by Donald Trump.

The screen appears to show messages from various top level government officials, including JD Vance, Tulsi Gabbard, and Marco Rubio.

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The "TM SGNL PIN" message is displayed on an unofficial — and less secure — version of Signal created by a company called TeleMessage, which makes clones of popular messaging apps, but enables the ability to archive messages
https://www.businessinsider.com/mike-waltz-photographed-using-signal-messaging-app-during-cabinet-meeting-2025-5?op=1
TeleMessage is an Israeli software company based in Petah Tikva, Israel. Founded in 1999 by Guy Levit and Gil Shapira, it provides secure enterprise messaging, mobile communications archiving and high-volume text messaging services.[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TeleMessage
Let that sink in
- Hello foreign intelligence agencies, would you like an easy way to intercept and read classified communications? Maybe just buy it off Mossad? JFC what is this clown show. Why are our intelligence officials even using off the shelf, or even modified, software solutions for communications? Shouldn't we have some secure messaging app and protocols developed here?
  Am I missing something here or is it really this dumb?
  
  They are going out of their way to use an Israeli platform to discuss top secret government business on. Seems pretty obvious why. They are taking instructions from ~~Israel~~ Russia!
- https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007321231-Archiving-or-unarchiving-chats
  Am I just being dense or does stock Signal already have this feature?
  You can also export the entirety of your Signal chats and decrypt them on a computer with an open source tool.
  I also thought they were using Signal specifically to avoid FOIA, which requires government officials to archive their messages.
  So it is possible government officials are using disappearing messages in Signal (which is illegal for multiple reasons), which will give a reason to use a third party app, not that this specific app should be trusted in any way.
  
  My understanding is that Archiving chats would be keeping a copy of these chats accessible elsewhere for archiving purposes and not directly related to the archiving feature you've mentioned.
  Signal does support chat backup which is close enough but its encrypted and its complicated to make one (for security reasons) and I am not sure its possible to view the encrypted chats without going through the process of restoring the backup.
- I don't understand, signal is open source, why would they need to purchase an unofficial fork from a foreign company? Isn't that an huge security issue?
  And what's the point of using end to end encryption if the app has been hacked to send messages to a remote server anyway
  
  Signal is lacking a certain feature "Archiving messages" . This company used Signal's open source code to add this feature and offer the whole thing as a "Signal plus" product.
  Assuming best intentions, Waltz wanted Signal but also wanted the ability to archive messages so he opted for the software provided by this company instead of the original.
- Petah Tikva.
  Sounds like a Klingon insult.
  
  Petak-T'kva!
  / stab
  
  It translates to "you have Play-Doh on your forehead".
- well that is how you become Israel's and Russia's bitch and sell your own country so they don't reveal the dirt that they found about you
- Preloaded with Pegasus at your disposal lmao
- Holy mother of fuck

We trained him wrong, as a joke
- I am bleeding, leaving me the victor!
- squeak squeak
- Someone should really try "my nuts to your fist style."
  
  That’s a lot of nuts!
- DA NA NA NA NA- NEO.
  DA NA NA NA NA NA NA- SPORIN.
- Eeny meeny miney mo
  I wonder where my glove will go

How did this photo even happen? They don't use privacy covers? Who's running this operation??
- This is the dumbass that is running the operation. Well, not anymore. He just got fired and nominated for ambassador to the UN.
  Seriously
  
  He just got fired and nominated for ambassador to the UN.
  Wait, really? It's getting impossible to keep up with this shit.
  
  Talk about paid-vacation, I mean, paid-suspension
- You're not supposed to have sensitive info on your screen in public in the first place.
  
  That’s why you have privacy glass meaning you can only read the screen from a narrow angle range.
- I have a polarizing filter on my phone, but that can be circumvent Ed with the right camera lens.
  
  Damn that Ed, always circumventing things.
  
  Next question: how does the rest of the photo come out when using that camera lens?
  Polarized light still feels like black magic to me, so I wouldn't be surprised if it would have a negligible to no effect on anything else in the frame, but my instinct says it would mess up a bunch of random things, thus making it useful for very specific spy craft type applications, but not for general use.

Super Secret MAGA Signal Archive App!
Download MAGASecretsApp.exe at MAGASecretsApp. ru now!
- Actually, it's an Israeli version of Signal, so it's literally the only people in the whole world worse at spying on their "friends" than the Russians.
  
  Not just spying.
  https://www.britannica.com/event/USS-Liberty-incident
  https://www.vox.com/israel/371491/aysenur-eygi-israel-palestine-west-bank-idf-biden-blinken

I'm just shocked he didn't have a post-it note with his code written in blue pen in the other hand...

So these convos are backed up somewhere. Outside of government control. Great.
No wonder they moved fast to block any investigation
- It's backed up to the Israeli software company that makes this unofficial version of Signal. Probably the only people it's less safe with than the Russians.
  
  i think mossad has work with russia in the past, and they would likely get thier hands on this, and russia can pass it on to iran who will leak it to Hamas,,,,etc.
- Noooo, it's not that they're guilty of anything... it's to protect from the deep state and the radical left commiefascist"insertbuzzword"s! I'd put "hey look at the bunny" but these assholes aren't even trying to distract anymore, it's just plain and simple corrupt government running for their own best interests while throwing out half hearted stupid sound bites to appease the brain washed.

Could it be that Mike was the insider that was leaking stuff to the media and this archiveable version of Signal is to be able to prove and/or keep Signal conversations that would otherwise be removed from the official app? I mean, just them using Signal is a violation of the Records Act, no, due to the ability to remove entire chats after a period of time? Everyone thinks he's incompetent or dumb, but he may have added that reporter on purpose to expose their use of Signal in the first place and he's using this unofficial version to save chats we would otherwise not have record of. If the insider info stops now, we'll know why.

Yo this is a real interesting read but the title is straight clickbait that makes it seem like the gov't is externally archiving signal messages for citizens.
- I read it as intented, since most headlines in the last month have been about their own usage of Signal.
- I mean, aren't they?
  
  It's TeleMessage, not Signal, but w/e

Jd Vance:
I have conformation from my counterpart its turned off. He'll be there.
Oh boy! Here we go a crimin' again! ᕕ(ᐛ)ᕗ

lol this guy can assemble into a whole war thunder forum on his own
"send top secret government chats to a server in Israel?"
YES / LATER

“We are currently clean on OPSEC.”
"Only the best people."
These fucking clowns. I've lived through an awful lot of Gov't by the Stupid...
(Remember when we thought Bush the Younger was the dumbest president ever...??)
But this freak show simply outdoes anything that came before. 🙄 🤡 🖕
- I long for the Bush era and that's fucking tragic.
  
  Golfs better than Trump too
  Now watch this drive
  
  ➕ 💯

This is a link to the modified app instruction.
https://www.telemessage.com/signal-archiver-android-installation-upgrade/

To make matters somewhat worse, tele message appears to be an Israeli company
- mossad, looking through the logs: "already knew that. tell us something we don't know ffs."
- Although they are owned by Smarsh, an American company.

Let your local magats know how you feel about being subjected to this shit show daily. Really let them know how you feel.
- They just mumble TDS and start pretending to speak in tongues.
  
  Up the ante

The article makes me wonder if Waltz is intentionally countering the counter-revolution.
Either that, or he's just stupid as fuck.
Maybe both.

Gotta save that juicy blackmail

Too stupid even for Trump to keep onboard.

Cunts voted for this. It’s not like we didn’t know they’re this incompetent and dangerous.
- And they'll still defend it too. Ugh
  
  They will so make them afraid for being who they are. It’s time they really feel our dissatisfaction with them for subjecting us all to this bullshit.

Hostile intelligence agencies can have a little espionage, as a treat.

what a putz

Probably backdoored
- Seems more like they left the front door wide open.
- You're thinking of Grind'r.

Wish I could read the whole article
- https://archive.is/IcPKY
  
  I'm so grateful for archive.is and every project like it
  
  Thanks

I doubt anything digital is private.

He's doing the job of a stand-up comedian. His paycheck should reflect that.

🤡

That is slightly better than using regular signal. I wonder if they only started using it after the leaks?
- No, it is not. Those convos are being stored somewhere, who knows if it’s even completely secure.
  Modified clients could be transmitting the private keys to the server.
  
  But not storing communications like this is literally illegal. It's not good, but it's breaking the law less.
- What would be funny is if Signal made some changes that break that app's functionality.
  
  How might they do that?

Lemme get this straight
It's a problem for the government to use signal because all govt correspondence needs to be on record and retrievable in the future
But it's also a problem to use archiving of encrypted chats?
Not an American, can someone explain?
- Sure. You are legally required to archive all correspondence by approved by our security departments software, not a corporate app that shares the info with corporations and are on unsecured servers. Our security warned them to not do this and they did it anyway.
  Also, do you remember "but her emails" for Hillary Clinton? That was because she used a private app for some of her emails. She wasn't using it to wage a war.
  Lemme get this straight
  It’s a problem for the government to use signal because all govt correspondence needs to be on record and retrievable in the future
  But it’s also a problem to use archiving of encrypted chats?
  Not an American, can someone explain?
  
  What stops the government approving the app themselves?
- Yes.
  The answer is that this is all a bunch of stupid bullshit and that the Trumplicans truly don't give a damn about laws that no one can force them to follow.
  At this point, there's really no point in trying to look for consistency or rational justification for anything these people do.
  
  What laws are being broken? If republicans control both houses, why don't they approve the app or change the law?
- No, both are a problem because they aren't approved and controlled.

114 comments