normies use encrypted communication way more than the cumulative historical usage of GPG or PGP; Signal, WhatsApp, iMessage, and now Facebook messenger all offer better privacy for the average person than GPG or PGP ever did, and are used by orders of magnitude more people.
It doesn't pass the smell test. FB has been caught numerous times mishandling data. Apple is a walled garden you can't trust, same with WhatsApp. Unless Signal is liberally licensed, we can't verify privacy there.
Also, using a phone number as an ID is a de-anonymizing technique. Industry absolutely does not do this correctly, or they wouldn't be a juicy source of analytics data. Governments court these companies to exfiltrate data they have on people. If the data were adequately protected, they wouldn't be able to do this.
Sending something over HTTPS is encrypted but it's not private to the other end. Nice sleight of hand but I actually understand what I'm talking about.
