Most popular messaging apps ask for one thing before anything else: your phone number. It feels routine. Almost every app does it. But a phone number is not a neutral piece of information — it is one of the strongest identifiers a person can hand over, and handing it to a messaging service creates risks that have nothing to do with whether your messages are encrypted.

Encryption protects what you write, but not the fact that you're writing it. Learn what metadata reveals about your conversations, who can access it, and how a private messenger can minimize it.

Learn how end-to-end encryption protects private messages, what it does not hide, and why it matters when choosing a secure messenger.