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Ideas for Signal Android Automatic Cloud Backups? (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I'm aware of how to set up chat backups on Android, but this only makes local backups that you have to manually upload or copy.

I'm trying to find a solution where I can set and forget backups to the cloud.

My requirements are:

It doesn't require me exposing the rest of my file system/cloud storage to a third party app without scoping (filesync works, but doesn't meet this criteria).
It can upload directly to a cloud service

So far, no dice :/

Is there some workaround?

P.S. my potential solution is move Signal to my Shelter Work profile, where I do have filesync installed, but then I won't have contacts access, which is a slight pain (and because I don't want to create contacts in my work profile).

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Yeah, Signal backups are pretty poor. I recently discovered that they're not included with a full Google device backup, so if your screen dies you're screwed, unless you happen to have backed it up manually to a microSD card, which wasn't the case.

Not to mention that you cannot copy or screenshot the security codes, so you have no way to verify the codes you wrote down on a piece of paper.

I'm all for security, but the user has to actually be able to use it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

This is not my experience. I happily copied the backup passphrase, and there's a spot under settings > chats > chat backups > verify backup passphrase It allows pasting there.

Further, you can set signal to allow screenshots too, under privacy > screen security

Hope this helps

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

So whats so important about chat messages that you actually.need to backup?

i'm also sentimental about all that i've written with friends, but honestly i don't really need to have it backed up.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

That's an entirely different question, but here's a few reasons: chats with family members who are no longer alive, photos of newborn babies, birthday wishes, serial numbers, links to useful content, notes to self, etc. etc.

Will life come to a sudden and laborious end with the loss of these, probably not. Would life be better if they continue to be accessible, for plenty of people, myself included, yes.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I save my backup code in my password manager and I'm able to just paste it from there into signal in order to verify it.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (2 children)

How did you get the backup recovery codes into your password manager?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

Kde connect can usually share clipboard contents too. I use that for for copying and pasting stuff between the phone and laptop.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I use the TalkBack screen reader and it has a copy last utterance to clipboard. So I was able to just select the passphrase so that it was spoken aloud and then copy that text to clipboard.