Synonym unveils Bitkit wallet, powered by Slashtags

One-step closer to the P2P economy

While the Web 2.0 has brought a vastly enriched user experience, it has also become synonymous with the oppressive dominance of a few large tech companies and governments. The modern web is marred by censorship, including financial censorship; active, passive, and analytical data collection, harming our privacy and security; centralized chokepoints for key services against which users are relatively powerless (e.g., drastic changes in a service’s policies, interface, or even sunsetting the service) and which form central points of failure; and a highly inefficient use of our communication infrastructure.

Users need new P2P tools that can set them free, which is why we at Synonym are proud to introduce a number of new tools, applications, and initiatives that help do just that!

Bitkit

Bitkit is a mobile Bitcoin wallet that breaks the mold with new, powerful features. It allows users to have portable social profiles, dynamic payable contacts, interoperable data feeds, passwordless web accounts, and more. Bitkit reimagines the wallet experience with a sleek modern design that abstracts away technical aspects.

Alfred North Whitehead once quipped that “Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them.”

Our goal with Bitkit has precisely been to make the Bitcoin and P2P experience so intuitive that users can obtain the benefits in a natural and automated manner. Bitkit combines three main technologies: Bitcoin, Lightning Network, and Slashtags, an open web protocol that we have been actively developing.

Slashtags

The Slashtags protocol allows for the derivation of additional key pairs from a standard BIP-39 Bitcoin seed. These additional key pairs can be leveraged by any platform to build uncensorable social profiles, automatically updated contact lists, contact payment preferences, passwordless authentication, integrated public and private data feeds, and more.

To make the protocol accessible to builders, Synonym has released a new software development kit and complementary “Playground” on our website.

Slashtags makes your data portable and censorship resistant. It also does so in a way that does not require a blockchain, paving the way for secure and scalable peer-to-peer applications that go beyond Bitcoin. That includes peer-to-peer credit.

Pear Credit

Pear Credit is collaborative vision and research project for developing peer-to-peer credit by Bitfinex, Holepunch, and Synonym.

The project focuses on developing tokens that have the same qualities of tokens on blockchains, but without actually using blockchains at all. This will enable businesses to easily, efficiently, and securely distribute credit tokens for their assets, products, and services. Transactions with the Pear Credit system will be free, instant, and peer-to-peer, removing any need for complicated routing and liquidity networks.

Blocktank Instant

Finally, we have also launched Blocktank Instant, a Lightning Network service that enables exchanges to quickly onboard users to the Lightning Network. The offering removes the need for these companies to run Lightning infrastructure or hire specialized engineers. Exchanges can rely Synonym’s Blocktank node for instant deposits and withdrawals for their customers.