What is Anonomi?

Anonomi is a messaging application designed to resist surveillance, centralization, and infrastructure capture through its technical architecture.

Rather than relying on institutional trust or policy guarantees, Anonomi embeds its assumptions directly into how communication, identity, and networking are implemented.

For the political and ethical motivations behind these choices, see the Manifesto.

Design assumptions

Anonomi is built around a small set of explicit assumptions:

Networks may be monitored, filtered, or manipulated
Infrastructure may be seized, altered, or shut down
Platforms and intermediaries may act under coercion
Users may operate under varying levels of risk

These conditions are treated as normal operating environments, not exceptional cases.

Architecture over policy

Anonomi does not depend on:

Centralized servers
Global directories
Account-based identity systems
Recovery mechanisms tied to external providers

Instead, communication happens directly between peers, using whatever transport is safest under current conditions.

This reduces single points of failure and limits the amount of metadata that can be collected or correlated.

General-purpose communication

Anonomi can be used as a general-purpose messenger, including:

One-to-one conversations
Group chats
Long-term contacts
Everyday communication

Privacy-preserving design does not require exceptional usage patterns or specialized knowledge.

The system is intended to remain usable even when users are not operating in high-risk scenarios.

Network resilience

Anonomi is designed to function across:

Unreliable networks
Filtered or degraded connections
Environments where direct internet access is unsafe or unavailable

Support for Tor and alternative routing mechanisms is foundational to this approach.

When conditions change, the system prioritizes continuity of communication over reliance on any single network path.

Open source and forkability

Anonomi is open source so that:

Security claims can be independently verified
Control does not rest with a single organization
The project remains forkable if governance or direction diverges

Users are not required to trust maintainers indefinitely.

Limits and responsibility

Anonomi improves privacy and resilience, but it does not eliminate risk.

It cannot protect against:

Compromised devices or operating systems
Malware or malicious input methods
Users voluntarily revealing identifying information

Using Anonomi responsibly requires understanding both its strengths and its limits.

Who Anonomi is suitable for

Anonomi is suitable for users who:

Prefer communication tools that do not rely on centralized identity
Want systems that remain usable under changing network conditions
Value transparency and user control over convenience-driven platforms

No specialized technical expertise is required.