Telegram, Signal Witness Significant Surge Amid Facebook’s Global Outage

So it appears Facebook’s loss turned into a gain for other social media as two private messenger apps, Signal and Telegram, saw downloads and user sign-ups soar during the extended outage of Facebook Inc.’s network of apps and services. Millions of new users joined the Edward Snowden-endorsed Signal on Monday, it said on Twitter. Telegram, whose functionality closely mirrors that of WhatsApp, surged 55 places to top the U.S. iPhone download chart, according to Sensor Tower.

Earlier this year, downloads of privacy-focused messaging apps Signal and Telegram got a boost, as users looked for alternatives to Facebook-owned WhatsApp, over concerns about changes to the service’s privacy policy. Signal saw about 7.5 million installs globally, through the Apple App Store and Google Play Store, between January 6 and January 10, according to Sensor Tower. Interestingly, Signal was founded by the WhatsApp co-founder, who later left the company due to pressure from Mark Zuckerberg, and privacy issues related to Facebook-owned products.

Meanwhile, Telegram saw 5.6 million downloads globally, in a matter of days, according to Apptopia. Signal claims to have “state-of-the-art end-to-end encryption” as part of its service, which prevents messages from being read by those who are not the intended recipient.

Both Signal and Telegram were also down in recent weeks.

Facebook suffered a six-hour outage that spanned its WhatsApp messenger, the main social network and photo-sharing app Instagram, shutting out many of its 2.7 billion global users. The situation idled some of the company’s employees and prompted a public apology from Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg.

Twitter Inc.’s network stayed online, with Chief Executive Officer Jack Dorsey tweeting his endorsement of Signal as a suitable WhatsApp alternative and amplifying Snowden’s urging of his followers to move away from the Facebook-owned app. Thousands of rooms on audio-chat app Clubhouse had people talking about the outage, a spokeswoman for the service said, adding that all its main metrics rose.

Signal’s focus on privacy — expressed in its policy to not collect any data on its users and thus avoid situations where governments may pressure it to disclose personally identifiable information — has made it a favourite for secure communications. Telegram has also historically added millions of users in the wake of major WhatsApp outages.