Can you guys suggest some reliable and secure selfhosted IM service? I’m kinda in a very bad spot right now, so any centralized messaging wouldn’t really work. And yeah, state sponsored mass surveillance is a question of concern. Sorry for odd phrasing, just really at a loss.

I heard of matrix, XMPP (heard good things about snikket.org), SimpleX and even some IRC wizardry over TOR. And I actually tried matrix (synapse server), but found it not reliable enough - sometimes skips a notification, periodic troubles with logging in, weird lack of voice calls on mobile client, and some other irritating, tiny hiccups. I’m open to any suggestion, really, even open to trying matrix once again. Just, please, describe why you think one option is better than the other.

And just FYI, use case is simply texting with friends and family, while avoiding state monitoring. Nothing nefarious

  • DaGeek247@fedia.io
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    1 hour ago

    And just FYI, use case is simply texting with friends and family, while avoiding state monitoring.

    Signal. There’s nothing better for security, ease of use, and features. It’s a drop in replacement for texts and imessage and facetime.

    • N0cT4rtle@lemmy.zipOP
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      53 minutes ago

      Thanks for reply. Unfortunately, we can’t use it, should be exclusively selfhosted service :( I do like Signal, tho, great app

      • DaGeek247@fedia.io
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        2 minutes ago

        That’s rough. Signal is the only app that can actually be trusted to resist state monitoring because it has a successful history of it.

        I guess another option to throw into the pool is https://docs.cwtch.im/ then. It’s new though, and not as easy to use.

  • Suzune@ani.social
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    1 hour ago

    There is probably something wrong with your setup, if Synapse has these problems.

    I’ve been running Synapse for years, including voice/videocalls and even video conferences.

    • N0cT4rtle@lemmy.zipOP
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      56 minutes ago

      That’s definitely possible. But the weirdest thing was the inconsistency of every issue. As an example - voice calls worked on the web client, but didn’t on mobile. Client issue perhaps, tho I tried, like, almost every mainstream mobile client

  • twelvety@fedia.io
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    1 hour ago

    Lots. But the difficulty as ever is finding something that the people you want to talk about are also using.

    • N0cT4rtle@lemmy.zipOP
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      54 minutes ago

      Let’s just that we all are so fucked, that we’d use anything that works. So that’s not a problem to convince them to switch, we all are ready to switch

    • N0cT4rtle@lemmy.zipOP
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      46 minutes ago

      That was a great video actually. I thought that Zuli was kinda cool, shame it’s a paid service. Not that I mind paying, just quite literally can’t. Funnily enough, they hit the same issue with broken voice calls on mobile Element client

  • medem@lemmy.wtf
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    3 hours ago

    Prosody (XMPP server). Setup takes an hour at most even if you have never worked with Lua. Easy to interact with (it has a built-in shell), easy on system resources, and easy-to-understand config. Support for groups, E2EE, attachments including videos and voice recordings, among others.

    • N0cT4rtle@lemmy.zipOP
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      58 minutes ago

      Thanks, will check it out. If it’s not too bothersome, could you specify why XMPP would be a better choice than other options? The protocol itself, I mean. There’s a lot of contradicting info on each of the protocols. Some say XMPP is ancient, choose matrix. Others say matrix is a complicated mess, choose more mature XMPP

  • Decronym@lemmy.decronym.xyzB
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    37 minutes ago

    Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:

    Fewer Letters More Letters
    DNS Domain Name Service/System
    PiHole Network-wide ad-blocker (DNS sinkhole)
    XMPP Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (‘Jabber’) for open instant messaging

    3 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 16 acronyms.

    [Thread #173 for this comm, first seen 16th Mar 2026, 21:00] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]

  • poVoq@slrpnk.net
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    2 hours ago

    Well, I think XMPP or Snikket is worth a try and definitely more reliable than Matrix, but you might also want to look at DeltaChat.