Signal: WhatsApp rival Signal now supports 40 participants in video calls – Times of India

WhatsApp Rival Signal has announced that it can now support group video calls with up to 40 participants. The company disclosed about this update through a post on Twitter. “Signal now supports 40 person group calls. Building large end-to-end encrypted group calls requires some new engineering.” The tweet read from the official Twitter handle of Signal. Till now, the platform only supported group calls with up to five participants.
In a blog post, the company has revealed that it uses selective forwarding units, or SFUs, to make this possible since Signal released end-to-end encrypted group calls a year ago. In this method, each participant sends their media to a server, according to Signal. The server “forwards” the media to other participants without viewing or changing it. It works with multiple participants, and is compatible with end-to-end encryption.
For those who don’t know, end-to-end encryption or E2EE is a privacy feature that ensures that only you and the person you’re communicating with can read or hear what’s sent , and no one in between, even the company. In simple words, your data is protected with a lock, and only the recipient and you have the special key needed to unlock and read them.
To make a group call on Signal AppAll participants must be members of an already existing group. You cannot add any users to a group call if they are not part of the group when the call is initiated. If you want to know how to start a group call with up to 40 users, you can follow these steps.

  1. Open Group Chat on the Signal app.
  2. Tap on the call icon in the top right corner of the screen.
  3. Select Start Call or Join Call.
  4. A notification will be sent to other group members. An alert will appear in the group chat history.

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