FireChat is a free peer-to-peer messaging app that allows you to send and receive messages without a direct internet connection or cell service. FireChat has experimented with decentralized (user-device based) and centralized authentication and started exploring blockchain-based logins.
FireChat is adding support for decentralized login with Blockstack.
FireChat has been used in situations where regular internet connectivity is not available or has privacy implications. FireChat has millions of registered users and has been globally used for disaster recovery and privacy use cases, among others. See FireChat featured in the Telegraph, CNN, and BBC.
We’re excited to see established messaging apps like FireChat find potential utility in migrating to a more decentralized architecture for logins. The privacy and censorship-resistant focus of FireChat is a natural fit for a decentralized network like Blockstack. We’ve worked with FireChat developers for several months towards this feature and have scaled the Blockstack infrastructure accordingly.
Instead of using a centralized server for login credentials, FireChat users can use decentralized usernames on the Stacks blockchain and login to FireChat using the Blockstack Auth protocol. The decentralized login functionality has already been rolled out to a subset of FireChat users and will be available to more FireChat users in the coming months. Login with Blockstack is available on the iOS FireChat app using TestFlight. You can learn more about FireChat here.
