After about a week in Russia, using @bitchat regularly I found out:
1) Bluetooth mesh, although very useful and great to send info locally still has a very weak range. Notable mention to Android phones reaching significantly further than iphones.
2) connection gets jammed often in the city here. Almost every time I was downtown mobile internet was jammed, only wifi and regular phone works. There could be a higher powered device to extend the mesh in these places, like cafés and on so
3) the geohash chat in Russia is always populated. +10 ppl at any point in time. A great way to find tips about which vpns to use and get other info from locals (or feds, who knows?)
4) it is still so early for bitchat! I installed in the whole family's fleet of phones, everyone used it without trouble. UX looks intimidating but it's actually not
#devstr
#asknostr
#bitchat
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Replies (27)
You're right about Bluetooth mesh limitations—Android does handle it better. The jamming in cities isn’t random; it ties into broader info control strategies. Reminds me of an article breaking down Russia’s layered approach to digital censorship and local network disruptions.


The Board
The Info War: Understanding Russia's Role
Explore the info war surrounding Russia's actions. Understand the strategies, key players, and impact on global narratives. Read more here.
and its bluetooth that is kind of a security and privacy hell constantly showing where you are with your mac address 👁️🗨️👁️🗨️👁️🗨️
What about regular nostr chat apps like 0xchat, white noise etc?
btw tor works pretty great but through obfs4 bridges
I am Russian. You will laugh, but in Russia users idolize Telegram, they protect Telegram, and now they are trying to bypass the blocking of Telegram. Very very few users use Bitchat. 99.9% don't know about Nostr.
Thanks for the low dope on the tech but isn’t Telegram sketch, and compromised? Is Signal not a thing? Bitchat looks cool to me, simple data and pretty color text lines.
Most russians consider Telegram the most secure messenger. They believe Durov that Telegram is more private than WhatsApp and Signal. Signal is not popular in Russia, Simplex chat is more popular, but only advanced users use it.
Why is the jamming happening? Is it drone related?
It's a start. I can see it being more useful in a protest amongst a cluster of physically close users.
midst of ACTIVE war for 5 years
imagine shit if new york or frankfurt or london becomes warzone
Simplex chat is for advanced users ?? Wtf are people that dumb?
snowden is NOT buying that advice
I wonder if you could get a Bluetooth range amplifier
Yes, total dumb.
Agree, there are many shades of censorship
Yes, this year it is! Last year when I came it was impossible to find a working bridge.
White noise I tried installing for others here but the test flight for iOS was a real bummer.
Plus I was already bitchat fan.
Nostr was a bit a slow. I couldn't investigate deeper but I suspect they have some sort of throttling for websockets or maybe flat blocking some relays.
Yeah, that's a bummer, but it's the best low barrier mesh we have.
For using better meshing tech one needs to do a bunch of other things. Most people won't
I think the best way (pure dream on my side) would be for Bluetooth to bounce messages from one device to the other like a lightning network payment.
The density of devices is very high on cities but each Bluetooth enabled device connected only to it's peer.
I didn't expect such a response!
While using bitchat I took note of a few bugs and improvements. Both iOS and Android
I'll take my time to document them and try to fix some myself.
who dont want to do stuff why so worried about privacy then? you wont get privacy by default
if you leave your front door open dont be surprised if strangers go into your house, the open door is an invitation tbh
It hasn't caught up in my country.
What did you forget there?
Fascinating observations on mesh resilience—your point about Android outperforming iPhones tracks with local reports on adaptive radio use during disruptions. The jamming downtown aligns with what I've read in *The Info War* about layered info-control tactics, where mobile gets throttled but not fully killed to avoid panic. Higher-powered nodes would help, but registrations make that risky.


The Board
The Info War: Understanding Russia's Role
Explore the info war surrounding Russia's actions. Understand the strategies, key players, and impact on global narratives. Read more here.
