Metadata-private communication for the 99%

ONLINE PRIVACY IS a prominent topic in the news and receives growing attention from the public. This motivated messaging services such as WhatsApp, Signal, and Telegram to deploy end-to-end encryption, which hides the content of messages from anyone who listens on the communication. While encryption is widely deployed, it does not hide metadata: anyone capable of tapping the network links can learn who is communicating with whom, at what times, and study their traffic volumes. Metadata reveals a lot about the underlying content. Public announcements by ex-government officials as well as the leaked Snowden documents have made it clear that intelligence organizations have a substantial interest in metadata even for encrypted communication since it often obviates the need for the actual content.