Secret Grant #4: Altermail, A Decentralized Messaging Service dApp on Secret Network

Secret Network
August 19, 2021
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Greetings community,

Today we are excited to announce Altermail – the world’s first blockchain-based decentralized messaging service protocol, built on Secret Network. Using a secure data integrity sharing model that provides privacy by design, Altermail is trailblazing cutting edge security and data integrity by using public and private keys integrated into the Secret Network blockchain to create immutable privacy guarantees. Business ideas, payments, confidential information, files – all now protected and backed by blockchain-based messaging technology; this guarantee allows you to privately communicate with peers, friends, or colleagues by using private messaging on Altermail.

Users will be able to purchase Altermail services using SCRT or sSCRT. The product roadmap for Altermail also includes the acceptance of secret stablecoins. Altermail has a vision of expanding the concept of a blockchain communication based platform beyond just email – eventually expanding to a messaging application as well. Specifically, Altermail is in the process of interfacing with Publish-0x (a crypto-agnostic platform where both authors and readers earn in crypto) on the creation of chat-rooms using Altermail.

Altermail will implement the Citadel.One wallet with potential integration of Keplr in the future – empowering Secret Network users to start their journey with Altermail seamlessly. For password protection, there will be private key recovery functionality if the user loses their password. This recovery is possible because encrypted passwords are stored directly in a Secret Contract. Altermail has signed an arrangement with two law firms to use Altermail as communication between lawyers and their clients for sharing sensitive data, bridging privacy from Secret Network directly to real world use cases.

Altermail is also a recipient of a grant given by the European Institute of Innovation & Technology.

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Link to Altermail: https://altermail.co/

The Mission

A narrative emerging from centralized communication platforms such as Gmail, Whatsapp, Telegram, Discord, Slack, cTemplar is about security and privacy as a key product feature differentiator. Unfortunately, this narrative is ultimately an illusion of security and privacy due to the core architecture at the heart of these technologies. Altermail aims to fill this gap by offering truly secure and private messaging based on blockchain technology, specifically Secret Network.

Altermail is playing a key role in unlocking the full value of a decentralized future because privacy is not only a human right, but also an important utility. Without privacy, users are in danger of damaging their social life, finances, control of data, and control of identity (impersonation risk). Surveillance by centralized entities and a range of data harvesting applications compromise our data – allowing malicious entities to leverage this data to manipulate economics, culture, global relations, and even “truth” itself.

The Design

Altermail’s system architecture consists of three layers – application, access, and data. The base layer is the application layer, it ensures the receipt and transmission of information and encryption are private secure by default. The access layer is controlled by secret contracts on the Secret Network blockchain. The secret contracts serve as the data verification and authentication storage mechanism for Altermail – all while keeping the metadata encrypted. Additionally, Secret Contracts serve as neutral, fair, and automated intermediaries for data integrity on Altermail. This is fundamentally a revolutionary use of secret contracts that no other data provider service to date can guarantee. Finally, the data layer is required to store user-sent data that is encrypted. Data storage uses a decentralized data storage system.

Because all of the data is encrypted in storage and useless without the proper private key, data can be available on decentralized servers such as IPFS in the future. The three-tier architecture used in the secure, seamless data model ensures application performance and security.

You can read more about the full architecture on the Altermail grant proposal on GitHub.

Altermail: Secure data integrity sharing model based on three-tier system · Issue #14 · SecretFoundation/Grants
Altermail: Secure data integrity sharing model based on a three-tier system Project Description "Altermail intends to be a privacy-preserving secure communication platform leveraging Secret Co…

Value capture for Secret Network ecosystem

A secure and private data-sharing application built on Secret Network will drive network usage growth in addition to user acquisition. Because Altermail uses Secret Network, there will be regular batches of Secret Network transactions – all of which can help increase gas usage on Secret Network and ultimately drive demand for the acquisition of SCRT. The Altermail developer team is extremely supportive of Secret Network because the success of Secret Network in many ways helps drive Altermail adoption as well.

The following is a list of key Secret Network specific initiatives Altermail is planning to implement to maximize the growth of Secret Network and Altermail:

  • Secret Network community growth. With every new subscriber to Altermail, Secret Network can gain another community member via advertisements and partnership awareness from both Altermail and Secret Network.
  • 1% of all revenue generated on Altermail will be devoted to the Secret Network Grant Program
  • 40% discount for Secret Network users – 10,000 unique registration links given to the Secret Network community
  • Active participation of the Altermail community with Secret Network initiatives

Altermail Community

Altermail’s community concentrates on bringing awareness surrounding how insecure and unreliable email and messaging apps are – applications that we use daily. No number of work-arounds will patch up the fundamental inherent insecure architecture of email.  This is why blockchain technology is so important. Using Secret Network & ECDH encryption, Altermail as a product has fundamentally different architecture than other non-blockchain based alternatives.

The Altermail community is focused on user experience, data immutability, and privacy. Altermail aims to add options to chat, create channels, and private in-calls in the future. Altermail’s goal is to reach millions of users by the end of 2022, including traditional institutions.

Are you interested in beta-testing Altermail? Sign up on Altermail’s official website to learn how you can help with the beta-testing process, and gain early access to this cutting edge technology!

Check out the following link:

Altermail Links: Discord | Twitter | Website | Reddit | Instagram | Facebook


Secret Network Developer Opportunities

Interested in building awesome Secret Applications like Altermail? If so, there are a variety of options available for developers to get directly involved in building Secret Applications on Secret Network!

Secret Network Developer Grants

The Secret Network Grant Program is originally funded with 20M $SCRT- currently worth ~$20,000,000. For simplicity, proposals are split into three categories: Secret Apps, for everything that is directly built on top of Secret Network; Ecosystem, for tools that expand Secret Network and improve general usability; and Network improvements, for major upgrades to the network itself.

Within the Secret Network application layer, Secret DeFi and Secret NFTs (private metadata) hold an exciting amount of use cases that have yet to be developed. Grants have already been rewarded for the development of the NFT reference implementation as well as Secret Fardels, a new kind of decentralized social media leveraging Secret NFTs.

With a list consisting of over 35+ grant ideas, get started with the grant application process today!


Are you a developer looking to develop full-time on Secret Network?

The Secret Foundation Fellow Program (Secret Fellows) is designed to involve more developers full-time in the Secret Network ecosystem. The goal of the program is to bring in talented individuals full-time to the Secret Network ecosystem for 3 months during which developers can work on Secret Network related dApp/ tooling development and receive competitive compensation.

Apply for Secret Fellows here!

For any other questions about the network and how to get started using and developing on Secret Network, join our awesome community on the Secret Chat (Discord) or Secret Forum.

Onwards & Upwards!

To discuss Secret Network and Secret Apps, visit our community channels:

Website | Forum | Twitter | Discord | Telegram