Introduction

Velum is end-to-end encrypted messaging that doesn't depend on any company to work. Each message is encrypted on your phone, split into fragments and carried over bridges opened by computers run by the community, the nodes. With that work, nodes discover VEL, the network's coin, the way blocks are discovered in Bitcoin.

This documentation describes protocol v3, which runs on {{chain}}.

What it solves

Encrypted messengers protect content, but almost all of them rely on central servers that know who talks to whom, when and from where. Velum aims for nobody in the middle to have that information:

• No phone number, no email. Your account is a key that lives on your devices. To let someone message you, you give them your alias, a link or a QR code.
• No central server. Messages are carried by independent nodes. Anyone can run one.
• No readable metadata. The network sees opaque fixed-size blocks, mailboxes that change every day and receipts that don't say who received them.

Principles

1. The network never sees content or who talks to whom. Only opaque fixed-size bytes, rotating mailboxes and anonymous receipts.
2. Hybrid post-quantum encryption. Every envelope is encrypted with X25519 and ML-KEM-768 at the same time, as Signal (PQXDH) and Apple (PQ3) do. Signatures are ed25519; ML-DSA is on the roadmap.
3. Nodes only keep fragments until delivery. Once there's a valid receipt, they are deleted. If nobody collects them, they are destroyed after 7 days.
4. Your devices keep your chats. The app uses an encrypted local database (SQLCipher) with the key in the iOS Keychain.
5. A network with everything of its own. Consensus, coin, tokens and market live on the same chain, with no dependence on any other.

How it fits together

Continue with Architecture to see each layer in detail.

What we don't promise {#limites}

We'd rather be clear about the limits:

• No system is impossible to block. A country can block domains, IP addresses or all of Cloudflare. We mitigate this with several gateways using ECH, direct connections between nodes and the node list stored on the chain itself. See Resisting blocks.
• A global observer can try to correlate timing. Someone who sees all internet traffic at once could match when something leaves and when it arrives. Three-hop Sphinx-style routes and cover traffic are on the roadmap.
• Post-quantum cryptography protects against what is known today. If the standards change, it will be updated.

Status