@Schroeder
I'm not sure that's new behavior.
At any rate, I recommend people make an XMPP account at dismail.de and then use ChatSecure on iOS or Conversations on Android (free through F-Droid) as clients with OMEMO encryption enabled. Fully encrypted, decentralized.
Opie and I are there, and it would be nice to have more people to talk to.
Thank you for the information. Much appreciated. I just may do that.
@Schroeder
It's pretty cool. I actually went there initially looking for another anonymous encrypted email like Proton, and around that time I was learning about the Wire shenanigans. Dismail comes with an XMPP account, so I gave it a shot. With the Conversations app, it's incredibly fast and responsive, and you get the fancy encryption algo if the people you're talking to all use clients that support it.
@voltronic I haven't used Wire in a while but did just now because of this article. While logging in it said "retrieving conversations" which I don't recall seeing before. Deleted. Gone. Thanks for posting this article.