Blockchain-based messenger 'Block Chat' debuts

South Korea's Blockchain Labs, which developed the Coov app for electronic certification for vaccination against COVID-19, on Tuesday said it has released the world's first blockchain-based messaging app "Blockchat."

Thanks to no central server, Blockchat boasts superb security as messages and content are stored only on a personal device. The lack of such server, the company said, means the messenger is protected from hazards like the recent Kakao Talk malfunction caused by a fire at the company's data center.
Blockchat also requires no separate membership registration and login, meaning little reason to fear personal information leaks. Users can also avoid ads like those in messengers that use personal information collected through membership registration and block indiscriminate links through a messenger, friend recommendations and violations of privacy stemming from leaks of contact information.

Blockchain Labs also said Blockchat's message editing function is a game changer in preventing cybercrime. Chat partners can modify messages both sent and received, so even if the relevant content is released, its reliability is inevitably reduced. Any modifiable content is thus not acceptable as evidence with any legal effect.

Blockchain Labs Co-CEO Lim Byung-hwan said, "Existing messenger services have earned massive revenue from advertising through the use of user information, so they've never been free," adding, "I hope that consumers who are sick of random contact links, unwanted exposure to advertising and abuse of messenger chats retake sovereignty over their personal information through Blockchat."

Blockchat is downloadable on major app stores, with full service to be available on Google Play Store from this month. The company will also add the functions of file transfer, group chat and voice-modified calls.

Write to Joo-Wan Kim at kjwan@hankyung.com