Building the messenger that deserves to exist
Group messaging without a central server is a consensus problem. We stopped patching the symptoms and rebuilt the protocol from the state machine outward. Here's the full story.
White Noise
The chat with no phone number and no central server to shut down.
github.com/marmot-protocol/whitenoise
White Noise v2026.5.22 Released
iOS push with on-device decryption, markdown messages, blocked users screen, deep links, Chinese support.
Two taps. Done.
Most apps demand your email, phone, and password before you're in. White Noise takes two taps and no personal data.
Are We Living in Nineteen Eighty-Four, or Is it Worse?
A comparison between Orwellian and 21st-century surveillance techniques
White Noise next release
Lots of fixes, polish, and a few shiney new features!
The Fallacy of Centralized Chat Moderation
Centralized chat moderation is a losing battle that sacrifices everyone's privacy without stopping bad actors: only users themselves, through decentralized tools and community self-policing, can truly keep their conversations both safe and free.
Marmot Protocol Monthly Recap: April 2026
April 2026 saw Marmot get a long-term home with the new Internet Privacy Foundation, ship key spec upgrades, reach four interoperable clients, and pay down technical debt = clearing the path for multi-device support next.
Before you use Nostr: Five Key Concepts to Recognize
Before you create your first identity or post your first note, there are five core ideas worth knowing: public keys, private keys, identity, clients, and relays.
Digital Identity: Attack Vectors And The Counteroffensive
Governments, corporations, and algorithms are closing in on your digital identity. Here's why anonymity is worth fighting for, and how to protect it.
Marmot Protocol Monthly Recap: March 2026
March: two White Noise releases, five clients shipping, a security audit landing in code, and a terminal client that finally cuts Flutter out of the picture.
White Noise v2026.3.5
We shipped v0.3.0, found bugs that lost messages, and went quiet to fix them. v2026.3.5 is the result: messages that arrive instantly with delivery confirmation, group chats that no longer drop messages, improved image sharing, and Amber support. New CLI and terminal clients join the mobile app. A different product from where we started.
White Noise v2026.3.23
Read the notes. Max doesn't hold back on what broke and why.
Marmot Protocol Monthly Recap: February 2026
A packed month.
A Cypherpunk Who Doesn’t Write Code: An Interview with Max Hillebrand
"Mean time to harassment" is the metric of freedom. Max Hillebrand builds tools to extend it, viewing privacy as the logical conclusion of human affairs. White Noise creates a parallel space: voluntary, not vulnerable.
Marmot Protocol Monthly Recap: January 2026
We spent January focusing purely on code, advancing the Sloth rewrite, finalizing the Slate design system, and hardening the protocol.
The Escape Hatch to Centralized Big-Tech: An Interview with White Noise Founder Jeff Gardner
The problem with Big Tech isn't just what they do with your data. It’s that they have it in the first place. In this interview, White Noise founder Jeff Gardner explains why it’s time to move toward an internet owned by users, not corporations.
We all Have Secrets, and That's OK
"Nothing to hide" is a misunderstanding of how freedom works. Privacy isn't for criminals: it’s the boundary that protects your identity, your business, and your sanity.
White Noise & Marmot Protocol: 2024-2025 Year in Review
Between 2024 and 2025, White Noise evolved from a research experiment into a production mobile messenger, establishing the Marmot Protocol to fill the gap for private, secure messaging on Nostr.
