Elon Musk has unveiled that X is rolling out a new feature, XChat, built on Rust with Bitcoin-style encryption. He calls it a “whole new architecture.”
On Sunday, Musk teased the launch of XChat, an end-to-end encrypted messaging platform. The feature would include disappearing messages and audio/video calling “without a phone number across all platforms.”
“All new XChat is rolling out with encryption, vanishing messages and the ability to send any kind of file,” he wrote to his 220 million followers. “Also, audio/video calling.”
Rust is a programming language known for its speed, memory safety and concurrency. The new architecture applies encryption methods similar to those used in Bitcoin.
XChat: Enhances Privacy, Aligns With Musk’s Vision
X (formerly Twitter) initially added its encrypted messaging feature in May 2023 for paid users. To X’s credit, it accompanied the new feature with an article on its help centre, breaking down the new feature’s strengths and weaknesses with unusual transparency.
“We’re not quite there yet, but we’re working on it,” Musk said at the time.
However, X paused the feature last week in order to focus on “making some improvements,” perhaps linked to the launch of XChat.
Further, the feature aligns with Musk’s ambitious “everything app” vision, similar to China’s WeChat. With the launch, Musk appears to push for a more decentralized version.
XChat is already accessible to some paid users on X. “It’s been a few days since Elon Musk is back in the office and we see that XChat is being rolled out to some users,” Nima Owji, an independent app researcher and web developer, wrote on X.
In April, reports revealed that Musk is stepping down from his government role to focus on his businesses. He formally exited as a special government employee at DOGE in May.
What is “Bitcoin-Style” Encryption?
Following Musk’s announcement of the XChat launch, developers and cryptography experts have pushed back, saying that Bitcoin doesn’t use encryption.
Samson Mow, CEO of Jan3, who is working on nation-state BTC adoption, took to X, writing that the world’s largest crypto isn’t encrypted.
Another BTC core developer said that the Rust programming language is woke, explaining that it’s also a bad idea for security reasons. “Bitcoin doesn’t even use encryption,” he added.
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