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  • Messages sealed on your device
  • One MLS group per conversation
  • Voice and screens, relayed
  • Servers, roles and forums
  • A wallet only you hold
  • Sixteen page templates

Your group chat, encrypted end to end.

ILLESTâ„¢ is servers and DMs, voice and screen sharing, a wallet and a page of your own. Every message is encrypted on your device, so the server only ever holds ciphertext.

A photograph of ILLEST: the channel general in a server called gremlin hours, with its messages, the members panel, the list of channels and the box to write in.
The app as it is. The people and the server are made up.
A photograph of ILLEST in its phone layout: the channel general, a message that mentions kaiyo marked in red, and the box to write in.

01Messages

Encryption you can check.

Your device encrypts each message, and only the devices it is for decrypt it. The server stores ciphertext and is never given the keys. Here is what it holds and what it does not.

Sealed in your browserAES-128-GCM

What you wrote

see you at nine

What the server holds

NHxV1dKT24bqhI3iYCa2X6bNfURqR2HM4q0e8IULbxlCgPaQTD466znljw==

Nonce34 7c 55 d5 d2 93 db 86 ea 84 8d e2

Cipher
AES-128-GCM
Key
Made once, thrown away
Server
Never given it

The cipher a conversation's messages are sealed with, here in your browser. The key never leaves this tab.

Sealed on your device

  • What your messages say
  • Your files, each with a key made for that one file
  • Your voice and the screens you share
  • Your password: sign-in uses OPAQUE, so it is not sent
  • Your wallet's keys

What the server knows

  • Who has an account
  • Which conversations exist, and who is in them
  • When messages are sent, and roughly how big they are
  • Your profile, which is public
A photograph of a conversation between two friends, its header marked encrypted with the group's epoch, and the list of conversations beside it.
  • A group per conversation

    Every DM and every channel is its own MLS (RFC 9420) group. Someone joins or leaves, and the keys change.

  • No plain-text fallback

    If a message cannot be encrypted, it is not sent. You are told why.

  • Keys you can check

    If someone's key changes, you are warned, and you can compare safety numbers with them.

  • Your IP stays yours

    Messages, files and calls go through the server. Your device never connects to anyone else's, so they never see your IP address.

What the server still knows, and what this does not protect

  1. The server knows who has an account, which conversations exist, who is in them, when messages are sent and roughly how big they are. It cannot read what they say.
  2. In a browser, the page's code comes from the server, so whoever runs the server could change that code to capture your password. The desktop app carries its code inside the app instead of fetching it from the server each time, so it does not have that weakness.
  3. On the desktop, your device's key is kept in your system keychain and used by the app's own process. The window that draws the screen can ask the app to sign you in or open a message, and is not sent the key. Another program running as you can read the keychain on Windows and Linux, and on macOS the app does not yet ask the keychain to restrict it. One command that moves an older device's key into the app is still present, so this is not yet a promise that no key ever passes through the window.
  4. Encryption does not protect you from your own computer. Another program running as you can reach what you can.

02Servers

Servers, the way you know them.

For a crew, a community or a few friends. Every channel is encrypted the way a DM is.

  1. Four kinds of channel

    Text, voice, stages for an audience, and forums where each topic is a thread.

  2. Roles and permissions

    Give out roles, decide what each can do, and see every change in the audit log.

  3. Invites and onboarding

    Invite with a link, ask newcomers a few questions, review applications.

  4. Everything else

    Replies, threads, pins, reactions, your own emoji and stickers. Search looks through the messages your device has already received, because the server cannot read them.

A photograph of a forum channel in a server: its posts, each with who wrote it and how many replies it has, the members panel, and the list of channels.

03Calls

Talk, and share your screen.

Join a voice channel and you are in. Share a screen or a window and each person chooses to watch: until they press Watch, your picture is not decrypted on their device.

A photograph of a voice room: three people on tiles, the bar of call controls underneath, and who is in the room in the list of channels.
  • Encrypted on your device

    Voice and screen are sealed on your device before they leave it. The server relays them and cannot open them.

  • Relayed, never direct

    Calls are relayed, not peer to peer, so nobody in a call gets your IP address from it.

  • Stages

    A few people speak, everyone else listens.

  • The controls you expect

    Mute, deafen, push to talk, and a volume for each person.

05Wallet

A wallet in the chat. Yours, not ours.

Send and receive crypto without leaving the conversation. The wallet is made on your device from a recovery phrase only you have. ILLEST does not hold it, cannot spend from it and cannot recover it.

  • Ethereum
  • Base
  • Arbitrum
  • Optimism
  • Polygon
  • Solana
  • Bitcoin

mothlampwhat do i owe u for last night

kaiyosent u a request

Asked you forSolana

42 USDC

dinner, your half

7kQmX4dYw2Ph9Rt3sLc8VbN5aJe6Fz1GuK2oMqWy9xTe

Check the address against something other than this message.

Paid 42 USDC on Solana

  1. Your deviceThe key stays here

    1. Unlocked hereYour wallet password opens the key on this device. It is not your account's password.
    2. Signed hereThe key signs this one transfer on your device. It is not sent to ILLEST.
  2. ILLEST's serverNo key here

    1. Carried, not changedILLEST's server passes the signed transfer on to Solana. It holds no key, so it can carry it but never change it or spend.
  3. The conversationBoth of you see it

    1. PaidA note that it was paid goes into the conversation, for both of you.

The people, the amounts and the addresses are made up.

A photograph of the wallet card: the balance, Send, Receive and Swap, and the coins held: ether on Ethereum, and SOL and USDC on Solana.
  • Several networks

    Ethereum, Base, Arbitrum, Optimism, Polygon, Solana and Bitcoin. Sending is built for each, tested against stand-ins for the networks and not yet with real money.

  • Its own password

    Spending needs a wallet password apart from your account's, so signing in does not unlock your money.

  • Requests in chat

    Send a payment request as a card, and they pay it from their own wallet.

  • It pays for ILLEST

    Subscriptions, usernames and shop orders are paid from it, in USDC on Solana.

In a browser, anything that can run code on the page can reach an unlocked wallet, so keep everyday amounts there. The desktop app keeps the wallet's keys and signs in its own process, so the screen asks for a signature and is never handed the key that made it. The words of your recovery phrase do pass through the screen: when you create a wallet, when you import one, and when you ask to see them.

06Names

More than one name, each styled.

Hold up to two usernames, or five with a subscription, and choose your main one. Each has its own colour, typeface and effects, and the effects stack.

  • Seen where you are seen

    In conversations, member lists, calls and your profile.

  • A name that changes hands is marked

    A name that moves to someone new carries a new-owner mark for a while, so nobody mistakes them for its last holder.

  • In your wallet

    The wallet lists the names you hold and sets your main one.

  • Bought and sold

    List a name at a fixed price, paid in USDC. It moves to the buyer the moment the payment is final.

A second username needs an account verified with Google, and opens thirty days after you join unless you subscribe.

A photograph of the wallet's Names screen: two usernames on one account, the one shown now and another, two of five used with a subscription, and a field to claim another.
  • Free2usernames
  • With a subscription5usernames

07Marketplace

Sell in your server. Trade usernames.

A boosted server can open a shop channel and sell items and roles at a fixed price. Usernames sell in the ILLEST server's shop: list a name you hold and someone can buy it.

A photograph of a server's shop channel: four listings, each an item with its seller, how many are left and its price in USDC.
  • Wallet to wallet

    Everything is paid in USDC on Solana. One transaction from the buyer pays the seller and the fee together.

  • The server holds no money

    It holds no key and makes no payment. It reads the transaction from the chain and counts it only once it is final.

  • Delivered when paid

    A role or a username moves to the buyer as the payment counts. An item is delivered by its seller, and both sides follow the order.

  • Subscriptions

    Paid in USDC for one, three or twelve months, it gives you five usernames instead of two, your page on its own subdomain and larger uploads.

  • Sixteen templates

    Monolith, Hologram, Vinyl, Arcade, Zine and eleven more.

  • Twenty-one kinds of block

    Links, socials, galleries, video, a music player, a countdown, a terminal, a 3D object and more.

  • A layout for each screen

    One layout for desktops, one for phones, and the editor shows exactly what a visitor sees.

  • Paid from your page

    Put your wallet on it and visitors pay you from theirs.

  • Public on purpose

    A page is public and is not encrypted. It is served apart from the app, to keep it away from your messages.

Your page is at illest.world/yourname, and with a subscription at yourname.illest.one.

Come in.

ILLEST opens in your browser. Free to use. Bring your people.