Say server A finds the users on server B to consistently be abusive, and chooses to defederate with it. Instances of Mastodon are also able to “defederate” from other instances if they find the content coming from the other instance to be abusive or distasteful, or in violation of their own policies on content. Instead, users can use hashtags to make their posts propagate to the rest of the fediverse and show up in searches. As it turns out, this is neither practical nor desirable. In fact, the lack of text search is due to the federated nature of Mastodon: to implement this feature would mean every instance would have to be aware of every post made on every other instance. This cuts down on harassment, because abusive accounts will have a harder time discovering posts and accounts using key words typically used by the population they’re targeting (a technique frequently used by trolls and harassers). Unfortunately, there is no analogue to making your account “private.” You can make a post viewable only by your followers at the time of posting, but you cannot change the visibility of your previous posts (either individually or in bulk).Īnother aspect of “fediverse” (i.e., the whole infrastructure of federated servers that communicate with each other to provide a service) micro-blogging that differs from Twitter and affects the privacy of users is that there is no way to do a text search of all posts. The software also offers robust privacy controls : allowing users to set up automatic deletion of old posts, set personalized keyword filters, approve followers, and hide your social graph (the list of your followers and those you follow). Two-factor authentication with an app or security key is available on Mastodon instances, giving users an extra security check to log on. We expect more bugs will be shaken from the tapestry before too long. Though it’s been around since 2016, the new influx of users and new importance it has taken on will be a trial by force. Mastodon is a largely volunteer-built platform undergoing growing pains, and some prominently used forks have had (and fixed) embarrassing vulnerabilities as of late. ĭespite its pitfalls, until recently Twitter had long had a strong security team. In the meantime, if you need truly secure end-to-end direct messaging, we suggest using another service such as Signal or Keybase. We hope to see this feature implemented for all users, but even a single forward-looking instance could choose to implement it for its users. Engineering such a feature would not be trivial, but it would give users a good mechanism to protect their messages to one another. Mastodon could implement direct message end-to-end encryption in the future for its clients. Many may expect those direct communications to have a greater degree of privacy. We feel that the intended usage of the feature will not determine people’s expectation of privacy while using it. But users of the feature may not understand that intent. Some have suggested that direct messages on Mastodon should be treated more like a courtesy to other users instead of a private message: a way to filter out content from their feeds that isn’t relevant to them, rather than a private conversation. Also unlike the centralized social networks, the Mastodon software is relatively open about this fact. But unlike Twitter or Instagram, you have the choice in what server or instance you trust with your communications. Just like Twitter or Instagram, your posts and direct messages are accessible by those running the services. This includes the moderators and administrators of those instances, as well. This will keep your communications safe from local eavesdroppers using your same WiFi connection, but it does not protect your communications, including your direct messages, from the server or instance you’ve chosen-or, if you’re messaging someone from a different instance, the server they’ve chosen. For basic security, instances will employ transport-layer encryption, keeping your connection to the server you’ve chosen private. Though in no way comprehensive, we have a few thoughts we’d like to share on the topic.Įssentially, Mastodon is about publishing your voice to your followers and allowing others to discover you and your posts. With so many users migrating to Mastodon as their micro-blogging service of choice, a lot of questions are being raised about the privacy and security of the platform. We also have a post on what the fediverse is, why the fediverse will be great-if we don't screw it up, and how to make a Mastadon account. This post is part of a series on Mastodon and the fediverse.
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