Nowadays, a majority of apps require you to sign up with your email or even worse your phone number. If you have a phone number attached to your name, meaning you went to a cell service/phone provider, and you gave them your ID, then no matter what app you use, no matter how private it says it is, it is not private. There is NO exception to this. Your identity is instantly tied to that account.
Signal is not private. I recommend Simplex or another peer to peer onion messaging app. They don’t require email or phone number. So as long as you protect your IP you are anonymous
precisely that’s why it’s become so popular and recommended and now these users are recommending it furthering the amount of people that will have their data exposed there was a leak I believe in 2022 and on signal a lot of customers had their phone numbers exposed if their phone numbers are not stored how did they get exposed? Clearly the answer is that they are stored.
Were there conversations exposed? Do you even understand the difference?