How does it compare to session?
Hadn't actually tried Session before so I installed it and gave it a try. Session seems way less schizo as they let you opt in to Firebase so you can have timely push notifications which would be unthinkable for the SimpleX people. Going between desktop and mobile is basically seamless, you scan a QR code and it "just works".
One-to-one and closed group messaging is E2EE and decentralized with node operators incentivized via a shitcoin called Session Token. The Privacy Guides people point out there's no forward secrecy, which would prevent a future key compromise decrypting past messages, but the Session people excuse it in this
blog post. Their argument is long term key compromise can only occur if your device is compromised, so they'd rather simplify their protocol than try to protect a compromised user.
There's a concept of communities as well for hosting a room with a large number of members, since closed groups are limited to 100 participants. Open communities (SOGS) are self-hosted using
PySOGS and are not E2EE, just encrypted in-flight. Your IP isn't revealed to the operator as requests are onion routed, but there's no decentralization so you're screwed if your favorite SOGS instance dies. Setting one up looks straightforward at least:
https://docs.oxen.io/oxen-docs/products-built-on-oxen/session/guides/open-group-setup
SimpleX can have large groups operate natively on its network and it seems they favor security vs usability. Session works well enough that my mom and dad could probably figure it out on their own and it is more secure than Telegram while more privacy respecting than Signal.
Whether you use one or the other may depend more on your friends and family than the technological merits of either one. Unless you love talking to yourself through overcomplicated buzzword-laden encryption protocols.
