Loading AI tools
Instant messaging software From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ricochet or Ricochet IM is a free software, multi-platform, instant messaging software project originally developed by John Brooks[5] and later adopted as the official instant messaging client project of the Invisible.im group.[6] A goal of the Invisible.im group is to help people maintain privacy by developing a "metadata free" instant messaging client.[7]
Developer(s) | Blueprint for Free Speech |
---|---|
Initial release | June 2014[1] |
Stable release | |
Repository | |
Written in | C++ |
Operating system | Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD |
License | BSD-3-Clause[4] |
Website | www |
Originally called Torsion IM, Ricochet was renamed in June 2014.[1] Ricochet is a modern alternative to TorChat,[8] which hasn't been updated in several years, and to Tor Messenger, which is discontinued.[9] On September 17, 2014, it was announced that the Invisible.im group would be working with Brooks on further development of Ricochet in a Wired article by Kim Zetter.[5] Zetter also wrote that Ricochet's future plans included a protocol redesign and file-transfer capabilities.[5] The protocol redesign was implemented in April 2015.[10]
In February 2016, Ricochet's developers made public a security audit that had been sponsored by the Open Technology Fund and carried out by the NCC Group in November 2015.[11] The results of the audit were "reasonably positive".[12] The audit identified "multiple areas of improvement" and one vulnerability that could be used to deanonymize users.[11] According to Brooks, the vulnerability has been fixed in the latest release.[13]
Ricochet is a decentralized instant messenger, meaning there is no server to connect to and share metadata with.[8] Further, using Tor, Ricochet starts a Tor hidden service locally on a person's computer and can communicate only with other Ricochet users who are also running their own Ricochet-created Tor hidden services. This way, Ricochet communication never leaves the Tor network. A user screen name (example: ricochet:hslmfsg47dmcqctb
) is auto-generated upon first starting Ricochet; the first half of the screen name is the word "ricochet", with the second half being the address of the Tor hidden service. Before two Ricochet users can talk, at least one of them must privately or publicly share their unique screen name in some way.
Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.
Every time you click a link to Wikipedia, Wiktionary or Wikiquote in your browser's search results, it will show the modern Wikiwand interface.
Wikiwand extension is a five stars, simple, with minimum permission required to keep your browsing private, safe and transparent.