Techlore Talks

Peer-to-peer networks have no servers—just devices talking directly to each other. Henry interviewed Mathias Buus Madsen, CEO of Holepunch, about how BitTorrent handled 40 million users without servers, why their messenger Keet can't go down even when usage spikes, their new P2P password manager, and how P2P apps are more energy efficient than data centers.

🔗 SOURCES & LINKS
• Holepunch: https://holepunch.to/
• Keet Messenger: https://keet.io
• Pears: https://pears.com
• Pear Pass: https://pass.pears.com

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS
00:00:00 INTRO
00:01:25 WHAT IS PEER-TO-PEER (P2P)?
00:03:16 BENEFITS OF P2P
00:05:38 GETTING STARTED IN P2P
00:08:43 NEGATIVE P2P ASSOCIATIONS
00:14:13 P2P CENSORSHIP RESISTANCE
00:17:14 P2P SAFETY
00:21:29 KEET (P2P MESSENGER)
00:26:21 OPEN SOURCE?
00:27:12 BEING SERVERLESS
00:31:04 OPEN SOURCE VS. CLOSED SOURCE
00:34:05 ARE UPDATES P2P?
00:34:33 IS THERE AN APK?
00:35:37 BACKGROUND SYNC
00:39:27 WHAT ELSE DOES HOLEPUNCH WORK ON?
00:42:04 MORE INFO ON THE STACK
00:45:00 FUNDING + TETHER
00:48:09 P2P PASSWORD MANAGER?
00:54:48 AUDITS
00:55:57 AVAILABLE ON LINUX?
00:58:33 CENTRALIZED/HYBRID P2P?
01:01:49 P2P DOWNSIDES?
01:05:01 APPLE FINDMY NETWORK
01:07:16 ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT
01:11:48 SERVICE DOWNTIME
01:12:52 HOW TO FOLLOW
01:13:59 OUTRO

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube

SimpleX Chat is the only messaging network where users have no identifiers—no phone numbers, no usernames, no user IDs at all. Henry interviewed founder Evgeny Poberezkin about how unidirectional message pipes create a network where servers don't even know users exist, why this isn't federation, how it compares to Signal and Session, and why the company is based in the UK despite encryption battles.

🔗 SOURCES & LINKS
• SimpleX: https://simplex.chat
• Evgeny's Website: https://www.poberezkin.com/about.html

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS
00:00:00 INTRO
00:01:31 SIMPLEX NAME
00:04:20 SIMPLEX TEAM
00:05:10 SIMPLEX VS. MAINSTREAM MESSENGERS
00:08:05 WHY THIS APPROACH?
00:11:14 THE FUTURE OF SIMPLEX
00:14:28 SIMPLEX NETWORK + FEDERATION
00:20:46 REGISTRATION MODELS
00:23:11 GOVERNMENT REQUESTS TO SIGNAL
00:25:42 REGISTRATION MODELS (CONT'D)
00:27:52 MESSENGER DISCUSSION?
00:29:54 SIMPLEX LIMITATIONS
00:31:00 WAYS TO USE SIMPLEX + SCALING
00:37:27 OPEN SOURCE
00:42:21 SIMPLEX ENCRYPTION + DENIABILITY
00:54:00 SIMPLEX METADATA
01:00:53 IP ADDRESS OBSERVATION
01:05:02 USABILITY CHALLENGES
01:09:53 MESSAGE DELIVERY
01:10:58 OUTAGES
01:13:14 MULTI-DEVICE SYNC
01:13:56 DESKTOP ONLY?
01:18:10 BATTERY IMPACT
01:19:44 BACKGROUND SYNC
01:21:50 FUNDING + SUSTAINABILITY
01:30:38 JURISDICTION
01:31:56 LEGAL + LIABILITY
01:40:37 PRIVACY AS A MEANS, NOT AN END
01:41:55 PRIVACY FOR THE MASSES VS. THE FEW
01:45:27 WHAT'S NEXT FOR SIMPLEX?
01:50:57 HOW TO FOLLOW
01:52:09 OUTRO

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube

You don't have to trust Obscura—you just have to trust that not both Obscura and Mullvad are compromised. Henry sat down with Carl, former Bitcoin Core developer and founder of Obscura VPN, to discuss how it's the first VPN that mathematically can't log your activity, what makes it censorship-resistant against networks like the Great Firewall, and what it really means to build privacy that's more than "a pinky promise."

🔗 SOURCES & LINKS
• Obscura: https://obscura.net
• GitHub: https://github.com/Sovereign-Engineering/obscuravpn-client
• Trust, 2-Party Relays, and QUIC: https://obscura.net/blog/bootstrapping-trust/
• Mullvad: https://mullvad.net

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS
00:00:00 INTRO
00:01:50 CARL'S BACKGROUND
00:10:47 APPLE'S PRIVATE RELAY
00:17:11 TRUSTLESS MODELS
00:19:05 MULTI-PARTY RELAY PARTNERSHIP
00:21:39 TRADITIONAL MULTI-HOP
00:23:39 CENSORSHIP RESISTANCE
00:27:33 MULLVAD VS. OBSCURA TRAFFIC
00:29:35 EXIT IP
00:30:18 BLOCKS, CAPTCHA, & SPLIT TUNNELING
00:31:16 CUSTOM DNS
00:32:41 PARTNERING WITH MULLVAD
00:36:05 OBSCURA VS. PRIVATE RELAY
00:37:10 OBSCURA VS. MULLVAD
00:38:33 OBSCURA VS. DECENTRALIZED VPNS
00:40:57 OBSCURA VS. TOR
00:41:58 REPRODUCIBLE BUILDS
00:50:23 CLIENTS & DEVELOPMENT TIMELINE
00:55:24 SPEED
00:59:06 DEFAULTS VS. CUSTOMIZATION
01:00:48 PRICING
01:02:43 OPEN SOURCE
01:03:34 THE OBSCURA TEAM
01:05:39 THOUGHTS ON THE VPN INDUSTRY
01:07:49 OUTRO

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube

The Digital Markets Act is a can opener for Big Tech's walled gardens, forcing Apple, Google, and Microsoft to open their platforms whether they like it or not. Henry sat down with Lucas Lasota from the FSFE (Free Software Foundation of Europe) to understand what the DMA actually does, why Big Tech is fighting it in court, and what it means for open source software and your digital freedom.

📱 RESOURCES
• Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE): https://fsfe.org
• Free Software Foundation (FSF US): https://www.fsf.org
• Public Money, Public Code campaign: https://publiccode.eu

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS

0:00:00 INTRO

00:01:36 WHAT IS THE FSFE?

00:04:12 LUCAS' ROLE AT FSFE

00:05:44 INTRO TO THE DMA

00:09:45 THOUGHTS ON REGULATION

00:12:47 PUBLIC MONEY, PUBLIC CODE

00:21:25 BREAKDOWN OF THE DMA

00:30:54 DMA ENFORCEMENTS

00:31:44 INTEROPERABILITY

00:36:20 DMA ENFORCEMENTS (CONT'D)

00:38:50 DMA CRITICISMS

00:50:41 USB-C ON IPHONES

00:53:03 APPLE'S "MALICIOUS COMPLIANCE"

00:56:57 UNDERSTANDING THE EU

01:02:12 EU COMMISSION & OTHER ORGANIZATIONS

01:06:58 DMA'S GLOBAL INFLUENCE

01:11:57 BIG TECH + INTERPRETATION OF LAW

01:18:23 OUTRO

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube

This special compilation episode brings together exclusive interviews from the Ad Filtering Dev Summit (AFDS) in October 2024. Henry sat down with developers and leaders from AdGuard, Brave, and the creator of the legendary Peter Lowe block list to discuss the state of ad blocking, new privacy features, and the future of tracking protection.

Featured Interviews:

• Andrey Meshkov (AdGuard CTO) - Apple's new system-wide filtering API and what it means for iOS privacy
• Sofia Orlova (AdGuard UX Writer) - Designing ad blockers for everyone from "grannies to techies"
• Anton Lazarev - How Brave Shields works, AI privacy features, and why native ad blocking beats extensions
• Peter Lowe - The 28-year journey of maintaining one of the internet's oldest and most trusted block lists

Topics Covered:

• Apple's new URL filtering API for iOS/macOS
• System-wide ad blocking vs browser-only protection
• Manifest V3 and the future of extension-based blockers
• Privacy-focused AI tools in browsers
• The philosophy behind different ad blocking approaches
• How tracking actually works (and why it's creepy)

🔗 SOURCES & LINKS

• AFDS Recap Video: [https://youtu.be/dr7XSnbyv7w](https://youtu.be/dr7XSnbyv7w)

🧡 SUPPORT TECHLORE
Keep Techlore Talks independent & growing:

This is a different kind of Techlore Talks. Henry sits down with Marloes de Koning, a Dutch tech reporter from NRC. This wide-ranging conversation explores tech policy from a journalist's perspective, and asks hard questions about age verification, digital sovereignty, news consumption, the rules & role of journalism, and more.

🔗 TAKE ACTION

• NRC: https://www.nrc.nl

• Twitter/X: https://x.com/MarloesdeK

• Marloes' Age Verification article: https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2024/04/19/het-hoofdpijndossier-van-de-porno-industrie-controleren-hoe-oud-je-bezoekers-zijn-a4196562

• Marloes' Tornado Cash article: https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2024/03/25/hoe-een-rus-uit-amstelveen-met-zijn-cryptomixer-voor-de-rechter-in-den-bosch-belandt-a4194203

• Marloes' Birthday of the Cookie article: https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2024/10/11/hoe-het-internet-een-geheugen-kreeg-a4868671

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS

00:00 INTRO

01:27 EARLY YEARS IN JOURNALISM

02:25 LEARNING & WRITING ABOUT TECH

04:28 DIGITAL SOVEREIGNTY

07:08 LOCATION OF DATA/COMPANIES

09:01 THE RULES OF JOURNALISM

10:31 THE ROLE OF JOURNALISM

19:11 INCORRECT ASSUMPTIONS

20:34 HOW TO FIND TRUSTWORTHY NEWS

30:06 IS CONSUMING NEWS EVEN WORTH IT?

34:55 AGE VERIFICATION

45:13 DO PEOPLE CARE ABOUT PRIVACY?

53:18 MARLOES' DIGITAL RIGHTS JOURNEY

55:19 WHAT'S THE END GOAL?

57:53 HOW TO FOLLOW MARLOES

59:06 OUTRO

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube

Google just announced a policy that could kill F-Droid and open source app distribution on Android. Marc Prud'hommeaux from F-Droid's Board of Directors calls it an "extinction event"—here's why that matters even if you've never used F-Droid.

🔗 TAKE ACTION

Keep Android Open (sign the petition): https://keepandroidopen.org

F-Droid Website: https://f-droid.org

🧡 SUPPORT TECHLORE
• Become a Techlorian: https://techlore.tech/support/#/portal/signup
• All Support Methods: https://techlore.tech/support/

🔐 MORE FROM TECHLORE
• Homepage & Newsletter: https://techlore.tech
• Our Course, Go Incognito: https://techlore.tech/go-incognito-course/
• Privacy Tools: https://privacytools.techlore.tech/
• VPN Comparison Chart: https://vpn.techlore.tech/

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS
00:00:00 INTRO
00:01:45 PIVOTING TO OPEN SOURCE
00:04:29 WHEN MARC JOINED THE BOARD
00:05:27 APP STORE BREAKDOWN
00:08:23 GOOGLE PLAY STORE VS. F-DROID
00:10:39 MALWARE & APP STORE SAFETY
00:15:45 ARE DEVS AWARE OF MALWARE?
00:17:40 WHY IS F-DROID ONLY ON ANDROID?
00:19:26 GOOGLE'S PLANS FOR ANDROID
00:22:44 HOW BAD IS THIS?
00:24:21 GOOGLE'S REASONING
00:26:21 HOW THIS IMPACTS F-DROID
00:28:42 WEB-BASED F-DROID?
00:30:05 DOES THIS IMPACT OTHER APP STORES?
00:31:35 WHY SHOULD REGULAR USERS CARE?
00:37:09 WHY SHOULD OTHER USERS CARE?
00:39:45 EFFECT ON DEVELOPERS
00:41:29 WHAT ARE THE NEXT STEPS?
00:48:54 WHY IS GOOGLE DOING THIS?
00:51:02 COMPARISON TO EPIC GAMES
00:52:58 IS ANYONE ELSE STEPPING UP?
00:54:31 WHAT KEEPS YOU GOING RIGHT NOW?
00:56:35 WHAT'S NEXT?
01:01:34 FINAL WORDS

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube

Even with encryption and 2FA, if someone steals your logged-in laptop, you're compromised. Michael Altfield created Buskill - an open source USB "dead man switch" - to solve this analog attack vector. In this interview, you’ll hear about the real incidents that inspired it, the advocacy work that fueled it, and the collaborative engineering efforts that turned it into a practical tool for protecting sensitive data.

🔗 SOURCES & LINKS

• https://tech.michaelaltfield.net/

• https://buskill.in/

• https://github.com/BusKill

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS

00:00:00 INTRO

00:01:43 WHAT GOT YOU INTO SECURITY?

00:02:32 WHEN DID YOU GET INTO SECURITY?

00:03:31 WHAT IS A DEAD MAN SWITCH?

00:04:33 WHY DID YOU DEVELOP BUSKILL?

00:06:25 WHEN DID YOU START MAKING BUSKILL CABLES?

00:06:42 HAS THE PRODUCT CHANGED SINCE THEN?

00:07:42 WHO ELSE IS BUSKILL FOR?

00:09:08 WHAT OPTIONS CAN BE TRIGGERED?

00:10:53 IS IT POSSIBLE TO TRIGGER A FALSE OR ALTERNATIVE ENVIRONMENT?

00:12:16 CAN YOU WIPE ON WINDOWS OR MACOS?

00:13:40 LINUX INSTALL OPTIONS

00:14:16 MACOS & WINDOWS INSTALL OPTIONS

00:14:25 CAN THIS BE DONE ON MOBILE?

00:16:39 REAL-WORLD BUSKILL EXAMPLES

00:18:13 BUSKILL COMMUNITY

00:19:17 BUSKILL + OPEN SOURCE

00:19:44 STL FILES + 3D PRINTING

00:20:38 IS IT GOOD TO CREATE IT YOURSELF?

00:20:50 INTERDICTION

00:21:42 EDWARD SNOWDEN ON INTERDICTION

00:23:24 OTHER ACQUISITION METHODS

00:25:13 NOVACUSTOM PARTNERSHIP

00:26:00 BUSKILL + NICHE LINUX DISTROS

00:26:57 QUBES DOM0

00:28:27 UBUNTU & TAILS

00:30:02 DOES BUSKILL SUPPORT CHROMEBOOKS?

00:31:19 GETTING INVOLVED IN PRIVACY + ADVOCACY

00:33:05 HOW PRIVACY IS VIEWED WORLDWIDE

00:36:55 PERSONAL CHALLENGES WITH PRIVACY

00:39:11 GO-TO PRIVACY & SECURITY TIPS

00:40:11 BUSKILL + SECURITY KEYS?

00:43:06 SECURITY THROUGH OBSCURITY

00:45:25 CLOUD-BASED PASSWORD MANAGERS

00:46:09 LIVING WITHOUT A PHONE

00:51:57 CAN IT GET WORSE?

00:53:18 PROPRIETARY BROADBAND

00:58:49 WHAT DO YOU LIKE ABOUT NOVACUSTOM?

01:00:56 OUTRO

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube

Ricardo Signes, Chief Engineer at Fastmail, explains why Gmail's email experience has become increasingly fragmented, and what it would take to actually fix the decades-old IMAP protocol that powers most of the internet. We dive deep into JMAP (the modern replacement Gmail won't adopt), privacy-by-design vs. encryption theater, and the hidden trade-offs between convenience and security that no one talks about. If you've noticed your email client feeling broken, this interview reveals why.

🔗 SOURCES & LINKS

• Fastmail: https://fastmail.com

• Fastmail Values Statement: https://fastmail.com/about/values

• Cyrus IMAP/JMAP Server (open source): https://www.cyrusimap.org/

• JMAP Standard (RFC 8620): https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc8620

• Web Push Standard (RFC 8030): https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc8030

• Signal (for encrypted messaging): https://signal.org

• Fastmail Data Transparency Report: https://fastmail.com/about/transparency

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS

00:00:00 INTRO

00:01:36 WHAT DRAWS YOU TO FASTMAIL?

00:03:29 FASTMAIL VALUES & PHILOSOPHY

00:08:49 FASTMAIL TARGET USER

00:12:43 LACK OF NATIVE E2EE

00:16:16 WILL EMAIL EVER BE PRIVATE?

00:18:23 FASTMAIL E2EE OPTIONS

00:23:43 FASTMAIL CLIENT OPTIONS

00:26:18 FASTMAIL INTEGRATIONS

00:29:49 BEING GOOD INTERNET CITIZENS

00:33:13 BAD INTERNET CITIZENS

00:38:26 JMAP & OTHER EMAIL PROTOCOLS

00:48:15 REAL-WORLD BENEFITS OF JMAP

00:53:07 ISSUES WITH GMAIL ON IOS

00:56:06 LACK OF E2EE FOR EMAIL WITH ADP

00:57:29 DOES JMAP MAKE E2EE EASIER?

01:00:43 FASTMAIL + OPEN SOURCE

01:10:48 PROTECTIONS AGAINST BAD ACTORS

01:14:46 PHONE NUMBER REQUIREMENTS

01:22:55 AUSTRALIAN JURISDICTION

01:25:55 THE FASTMAIL TEAM

01:28:45 PRODUCTIVITY-FOCUSED EMAIL CLIENTS

01:34:27 FASTMAIL + IMAP

01:35:49 WHY THE NAME "FASTMAIL"?

01:38:27 IS JMAP WHY FASTMAIL IS SO FAST?

01:42:03 FASTMAIL'S IDEAL AVATAR + FUTURE PLANS

01:46:25 HOW TO FOLLOW RICARDO + FASTMAIL

01:48:03 OUTRO

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube

When you sign into Chrome, Google collects your entire browsing history to build behavioral profiles for targeted ads. In this interview, Firefox CTO Bobby Holley breaks down why Mozilla maintains Gecko as an independent engine, how Firefox approaches privacy differently from Google and Apple, and why the stakes for browser independence are higher than ever.

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS

00:00 INTRO

01:24 CTO DAY IN THE LIFE

03:34 STICKING WITH GECKO OVER CHROMIUM

06:33 COMPETING ON PRIVACY

09:06 PRIVACY IN FIREFOX

21:03 INSPIRATION FROM THE TOR PROJECT

22:57 WHAT USERS GAIN FROM FIREFOX

26:56 THE BEST FIREFOX CONFIGURATION

29:59 MANIFEST V2 VS. V3 + AD BLOCKING

30:53 MAINTAINING MANIFEST V2

32:26 UBLOCK ORIGIN BY DEFAULT?

33:46 FIREFOX'S APPROACH TO AI

39:14 GECKO ON IOS?

42:25 FEELINGS ABOUT THE DMA IN EUROPE

43:53 WINDOWS DEFAULT BROWSER BEHAVIOR

44:52 DMA ENGINE CHOICE PROVISIONS

45:13 BEING THE DEFAULT BROWSER ON LINUX

46:52 NEW THREATS TO PRIVACY

50:33 HOW TO FOLLOW BOBBY & FIREFOX

51:47 OUTRO

🎥 VIDEO
Watch on YouTube