Jack Dorsey tests Bitchat — decentralized messaging without internet

Block CEO Jack Dorsey has released a white paper and launched a beta for Bitchat, a decentralized messaging app using Bluetooth mesh networks for internet-free, encrypted communication.

Block CEO and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey has launched the beta version of a new decentralized peer-to-peer messaging service that runs entirely over Bluetooth. 

Jack Dorsey said his weekend was spent learning about “Bluetooth mesh networks, relays, store and forward models, message encryption models, and a few other things” as he introduced Bitchat on X on Sunday. 

The “Bluetooth mesh chat” system has “IRC [Internet Relay Chat] vibes,” Dorsey added, harking back to the early days of web-based messaging systems in the late 1990s.