Oh look it's me.
I'll just say that the main issue with SimpleX is that it lies in its marketing material that it has no identifiers. What they really mean is that they're not adding new identifiers in the app, it doesn't mean they're actively removing existing identifiers, that is, your IP address. The client currently routes messages through two hosting providers which reduces incidental metadata collection. But it does fuck all if the hosting providers collaborate unbeknownst to the users.
That being said, SimpleX has really good support for Tor, in that if you just install tor package to Linux over apt or whatever, and configure like two items in the app's proxy settings, the client will automatically switch to SimpleX Onion Service servers instead of routing to clearnet servers through exit nodes. I can respect that.
What I can't respect is the threat model being treated like a fine print that's buried beneath menus: When you claim to be the most private messenger out there you need to act the part.
The notion that SimpleX has the effect of keeping users anonymous where the SMP servers under the domain simplex.im are used, is a total scam.
A SQL query would defeat the purported anonymity in many cases. An ai model would look at the other cases where IPs of VPNs or Tor are used, uncover much, and yawn.
Now another set of servers are operated by Flux. That helps. But you know how BFFs are with each other, inter-team access to data sinks.
These posts on Reddit and this orange reddit over here by maqp are high quality. They should be read thoroughly.
On the other side of this, the ability to change the receiving server with zero-interaction by remote contacts does lay a cornerstone for effectively anonymizing users. The option to add additional servers used by a SimpleX profile is another cornerstone.
But the mainline user interface hasn't been updated to use these effectively.
What I do like about SimpleX is it is, with a massive asterisk, distributed. SimpleX in practice lives somewhere between decentralized and distributed right now. SimpleX as used by the unwashed masses and disregarding everyone else, is decentralized, or quasi-decentralized.
SimpleX is not confined to a centralized permissioned namespace like Signal 501c3's service which is total vendor lock-in, for fools (yes if you are using that service, you have been had).
SimpleX has shirked the manual processes that XMPP+OMEMO users need to proactively do for a distributed experience.
The audited core Haskell code is hard to argue with. Looking forward to a successor in Lean.
But today, both SimpleX and the better XMPP clients are best enjoyed with community-managed container compose files.
I have read in places apparently originated from more than two minds some zero knowledge approaches that do functionally mitigate any usable identifiers, sans where users are of a small crowd and rarely ever change source IPs, so as much as may ever be practicable with current generations of IP (Reticulum with no source addresses looking better and better). Will be cool to see these implemented.
There may also be a way to do multiple redundant server paths that may be more efficient.
Much waiting to be done, things simply throwing an LLM at won't achieve.
I am convinced by the behavior of some degenerates that one of among those things is not a polished iOS app. iOS is a total cancer. iOS, for which no source code is available outside of Apple and its puppeteers, is for slaves. Voluntarily use of iOS, is an explicit admission cybersecurity-illiteracy.