goTenna and Samourai Wallet Partner to Launch TxTenna: the Only Way to Use Bitcoin Regardless of Internet Access

goTenna, the mesh networking company at the forefront of decentralized communications technology, today announces that TxTenna is now available to the general public on the Google Play Store. TxTenna is the first and only platform that allows for truly decentralized bitcoin transactions, allowing users to send bitcoin without an internet connection, cell signal or any other sort of centralized connectivity. The app was built by the makers of Samourai Wallet, the world’s most advanced and secure bitcoin wallet, and leverages goTenna’s Aspen Grove mesh protocol and goTenna Mesh devices. TxTenna enhances the privacy, accessibility and censorship-resistance tenets central to the global Bitcoin network.

To download TxTenna, go to: TxTenna.com

While lauded as one of the most private and secure types of currencies available, the majority of bitcoin transactions are all still routed using traditional Internet ‘broadcasts’ that travel through centralized carriers and ISPs that can censor or record metadata for every transaction. In the United States and Europe, these carriers and ISPs are consolidated to just a few major providers, who control consumer access to those services and do so sometimes at the peril of public safety. In other countries throughout the world, these networks are often state-controlled and subject to censorship, surveillance or even being shut off.

“Bitcoin transactions are not as private or unstoppable as many think,” said Daniela Perdomo, goTenna’s founder and CEO. "The reality is that local carriers or ISPs can associate subscribers with their transactions or censor Bitcoin transactions altogether. TxTenna provides an answer to these problems by decentralizing the critical transport layer to enable truly decentralized bitcoin transactions.”

Here’s how TxTenna works:

• Download the Samourai Wallet and TxTenna for Android and pair the app to a goTenna Mesh device

• From there, you can create and sign an offline transaction to send bitcoin to anyone in the world and broadcast it to the Bitcoin network

• Depending on the distance to an online mesh node running TxTenna, the bitcoin transaction will relay across other goTenna Mesh devices until the transaction is received by the final online, Android phone

• While the online gateway node must have an Android device that is also running TxTenna and paired to a goTenna Mesh device, intermediate relay nodes do not need to run TxTenna

• Once the online gateway node receives the bitcoin transaction, their phone will send that transaction to an open source pushTX server which sends back a confirmation to the online gateway node via the internet

• Once the gateway node receives confirmation, it returns that information to the original bitcoin sender, again via the mesh network

TxTenna was built using goTenna’s SDK (Software Development Kit), an open-source platform for creating unique applications of goTenna’s mesh networking technology. TxTenna was first revealed in May 2018 at Consensus 2018, CoinDesk’s annual blockchain technology summit.

The news follows on goTenna’s recent release of Push for Help, a first-of-its-kind emergency beacon system that leverages mesh networking to create a digital safety net in times of distress.

The free app is available now for Android devices via the Google Play Store, with iOS functionality expected in 2019.  

About goTenna

Based in Brooklyn, goTenna creates modular mobile ad-hoc networking protocols and devices that are easy-to-use, low-cost and developer-friendly. goTenna was co-founded by siblings Daniela and Jorge Perdomo, whose shared experiences of losing service at a critical time sparked their vision to build an alternative, self-reliant communications network compatible with smartphones. The company is backed by notable investors like Union Square Ventures, Walden Venture Capital, MentorTech Ventures, BBG Ventures (a subsidiary of Verizon), and Bloomberg Beta. Its retail partners include REI, Cabela’s and Academy Sports + Outdoors. For more information, visit gotenna.com.

About Samourai Wallet:

We are privacy activists who have dedicated our lives to creating the software that Silicon Valley will never build, the regulators will never allow, and the VC’s will never invest in. We build the software that Bitcoin deserves. (from SamouraiWallet.com)

Contact Information

Maggie Philbin

Associate Director

Wareness for goTenna

press@gotenna.com