What you say is private. The actual content of your messages - scrambled into mathematical gibberish that only you and your recipient can decode. Military-grade encryption. Unbreakable. No one can read your words. Not Meta. Not Signal. Not Apple. Not the government. Not hackers. The technology works exactly as advertised.
Except.
There’s this thing attached to every message. It’s called “metadata”.
It’s who you messaged. When you messaged them. How often. How long the conversation lasted. Your location when you sent it. Their location when they received it. The device you used. Your IP address. Which WiFi network you were on. What groups you belong to. Who else is in those groups. The patterns of your communications - do you message more in the morning or evening? Do you talk to this person daily or weekly? Did your messaging pattern change recently?
Metadata doesn’t particularly care what you have said. Instead, it maps who you are, who you know, where you go, what you do, when you do it.
Your words are encrypted.
Your life is an open book.