Cleaner screens, useful details
Chat and contact filters bring more control to the main lists. Privacy brings together the connection location, local storage, unread counters, email support and build information.
ARCTIC MESSENGER WORKING TESTBED
Private messages.
Clear boundaries.
A working testbed for encrypted messaging, local history and delivery across a relay. The next version is in active development and testing.
Real iPhone capturesVersion 0.1 · build 69Encrypted local history
DEVELOPMENT JOURNAL / SEPTEMBER 2026 / VERSION 0.1 · BUILD 69
A crisper interface.
More room for the conversation.
Build 69 refines the everyday flow through Chats, Contacts and Privacy. Search and filters are easier to reach, storage labels are clearer, and support is now accessible from Privacy. These six new iPhone captures show the changes in context.
Keep the earlier chapters
The previous eight screens remain below as the build 31 archive. Compare the layouts, read the earlier QR-card and username explanations, and follow how Messenger evolves.
A working testbed, with the next product generation in active development and testing. The new captures document interface changes; they do not establish a new encryption protocol or an independently audited release.
01 / Build 69 / Chats
Your chats. A clearer starting point.
A quieter conversation list puts search and three filters at the top: All, Unread and Archived. Each row shows the contact name, a time or date and an encrypted-message count, keeping message previews out of this overview.
When to use it
Find a chat by name, focus on unread conversations or return to an archived chat. The new layout gives these everyday actions a consistent place.
What matters
- Search chats by name
- All, Unread and Archived views
- Message counts without content previews
02 / Build 69 / Contacts
Find a contact. See their trust state.
Name search and All, Verified, Unverified and Blocked filters make the contact list easier to navigate. Each card keeps the verification state, a chat shortcut and an additional-actions menu together.
When to use it
Look up a person by the label saved on this device, narrow the list by verification state and open a conversation from their card. A local label remains separate from the contact’s cryptographic identity.
What matters
- Search contacts by name
- Four contact-state filters
- Chat shortcut and per-contact actions
03 / Build 69 / Privacy
Fewer distractions. Clearer controls.
Privacy now starts with a simple connection card and the relay location shown as Kansas. Storage, Unread messages, Help and About Arctic are arranged below as focused sections.
When to use it
Check the displayed connection location, inspect local data or find support from one screen. Expand the section you need while the other controls stay compact.
What matters
- Connection location at a glance
- Focused storage and unread sections
- Help and version information in Privacy
04 / Build 69 / Storage
Know what takes up space.
Storage uses plain labels for Stored messages, Photos & voice, Waiting to send and Incoming messages. The totals describe encrypted message data on this device, rather than the total installed app size.
When to use it
Check local storage and pending messages before clearing media. Clear photos & voice removes sent and received media from chats on this device; text and messages waiting to send stay.
What matters
- Local message and media totals
- Outgoing and incoming queue counts
- Cleanup scope explained beside the action
05 / Build 69 / Unread messages
Attention stays on your device.
The Local attention panel brings unread messages, conversations with unread messages and manual reminder marks into one view. A combined count shows how many conversations need attention.
When to use it
Review outstanding conversations and mark them read locally. The action is disabled in this capture because nothing needs attention.
What matters
- Unread-message and conversation counts
- Manual reminder marks
- No read receipts in Protocol 0.1
06 / Build 69 / Help and About
Support is easier to reach.
Help is available from Privacy, with an email address, a Write email action and a Copy email address action. About Arctic identifies the captured app as version 0.1, build 69.
When to use it
Open your email app, write and review a support request there, or copy the address. Arctic does not automatically attach chats, photos, voice messages or account data. Further in-app help is planned.
What matters
- Support entry inside Privacy
- Email handoff with no automatic chat attachments
- Visible version and build number
DEVELOPMENT ARCHIVE / SEPTEMBER 2026 / BUILD 31
The earlier interface.
Kept as part of the story.
These eight original captures and their descriptions are preserved from the earlier test build. They show the interface and development context at that time; build 69 appears above.
01 / Chats / local history
Pick up the conversation.
The Chats screen brings together local conversations and encrypted-message counts. A restored account can reopen its existing history without turning the conversation list into a wall of message previews.
When to use it
Find a conversation on this device, check its local history and open it when you want to read. The build banner identifies the test configuration behind this capture.
What matters
- Local conversation list
- Encrypted-message counts
- Restored account and build context
02 / Contacts / trust and identity
A name you recognise. A key you verify.
Contacts keeps a local label beside each contact’s verification state. The labels “samsung” and “16e” identify the contacts on this device; changing a label does not change the contact’s cryptographic identity.
When to use it
Use a recognisable local label, then compare the device verification code through a trusted independent channel. A Verified badge records that local confirmation; it is not identity certification by Arctic.
What matters
- Local labels stay separate from keys
- Verification belongs to the current key
- A changed key requires a new comparison
03 / Contact Card / QR import
Exchange a contact card. Keep private keys private.
Scan a QR code, choose its image from Photos or open an image file. The QR carries an Arctic Contact Card: structured information that helps the app address encrypted delivery and identify the peer’s public key.
When to use it
Review a card before adding the contact. A valid QR is a way to exchange contact information, not proof of who sent it. Compare the device verification code before trusting the new contact.
What matters
- Camera, Photos or file import
- Public key and delivery-routing information
- No private key or mailbox retrieval token
04 / Username / discovery preferences
Finding someone is different from trusting them.
An account username is intended to offer a readable way to find a contact. It is distinct from the private labels you assign locally and from the public key used for encryption.
When to use it
Read the current status and discovery control separately from a saved registration result. Once a contact has been resolved, key verification remains a separate step; a matching name does not authenticate a person.
What matters
- Account username versus local label
- Saved request versus current status
- Discovery preference versus verified identity
05 / Privacy / account overview
See what the application is doing.
The Privacy screen groups account readiness, connection details, encrypted storage, unread counts and notification settings. It gives the user one place to inspect those different boundaries.
When to use it
Start here when checking whether the account is ready or looking for a specific privacy control. Open the relevant section instead of inferring every subsystem’s state from one green indicator.
What matters
- Account readiness
- Connection and storage sections
- Local attention and notification controls
06 / Private relay / delivery service
The relay delivers the envelope.
A relay routes and temporarily queues encrypted message envelopes. The client holds the message-decryption keys. The displayed mailbox is a routing identifier; it is different from the protected retrieval credential used to collect its queued envelopes.
When to use it
Inspect the connection and request a relay check. Connection health tells you whether an endpoint responds; it does not prove that a particular message reached another person or was read.
What matters
- Encrypted content travels through the relay
- Mailbox ID is not a retrieval key
- HTTP/3 and HTTP/2 checks are transport diagnostics
07 / Encrypted storage / local totals
Understand what stays on your device.
Storage shows aggregate ciphertext counts and sizes, including local media, the outbound queue and incoming staging. These totals can be calculated without opening message previews.
When to use it
Check which stage holds data before cleaning up. The media action clears eligible sent or received photo and voice items locally; text and queued attachments are excluded.
What matters
- Encrypted local history
- Outgoing queue versus incoming staging
- Local media cleanup
08 / Local attention / private notifications
A useful alert without a message preview.
Unread counts and manual reminder marks stay on this device. Protocol 0.1 sends no read receipts. The notification example uses a generic “Arctic — New message” alert without a sender name or message content.
When to use it
Manage what needs attention locally and keep message details off system alerts. Marking a conversation read here does not send a read confirmation to the other person.
What matters
- Local unread and reminder state
- No read receipts in Protocol 0.1
- Generic notification content
INCLUDED FREE / BUILT-IN MEDIA TOOLS
A different voice.
A lighter photo.
Voice transformation and photo compression are part of Messenger’s free feature set. Both are implemented in the current testbed and process media on the device before message encryption.
The Arctic voice effect
Voice notes pass through a local transformation that gives recordings the standard Arctic robotic timbre. The transformed recording is encoded and encrypted before delivery; raw microphone audio is not sent to a voice-processing service.
The current testbed supports clips up to 15 seconds. The effect changes how a voice sounds; it does not guarantee that a speaker cannot be recognised.
Smaller images, less metadata
Photos are resized and compressed on the device before encryption. Re-encoding produces a new JPEG without the original GPS/EXIF fields, reducing the data sent and keeping source camera metadata out of that outgoing copy.
Photos are compressed toward a target size of 512 kB, with a maximum of about 524 KB per image. Compression can reduce image detail; visible information within the picture remains visible to its recipient.
PRODUCT DIRECTION / FREE AND PAID FEATURES
Everyday tools.
More ways to make it yours.
Our product model keeps voice transformation and photo compression free. Planned paid additions will expand shared conversations and personalisation.
Groups and shared chat spaces
Create spaces for a community, project or team to talk together. Group creation and expanded shared-chat capabilities are planned paid features, separate from the one-to-one conversation flow shown in this testbed.
Arctic emoji and cosmetic collections
A distinctive set of Arctic emoji and optional cosmetic additions will give conversations their own character. Premium collections and appearance options are part of the planned paid offering.
Groups, shared chat spaces and cosmetic collections are in the product roadmap. Final packages, prices and release dates have not been announced; these additions are not demonstrated by the current screenshots.
FOR ORGANISATIONS / PLANNED PAID SERVICE
Your teams.
Your dedicated relay network.
For organisations planning private employee groups and chat spaces, we intend to offer separately priced relay deployments. Servers would be provisioned for the company in agreed locations, with its messaging traffic assigned to that dedicated network.
Relay locations matched to your teams
For a company with offices in two countries, the proposed setup places dedicated VPS relay nodes in both agreed locations. Corporate clients would be configured to use those company-assigned relays, with no automatic fallback to the shared public relay pool.
A private tunnel across the internet
An authenticated, encrypted VPN tunnel would link the company’s relay nodes across the public internet. It adds protection to inter-server traffic while message contents remain encrypted for their recipients.
How would the corporate service be scoped?
The paid deployment would be agreed around company locations, capacity, administration and support needs. Employee membership, group key management and relay access policy require their own implementation and validation before this service can launch.
Server locations describe where the relay nodes are hosted. They do not guarantee that every internet packet stays within those countries. Routing, operational metadata, retention and failover would be defined explicitly for each deployment.
Why use a VPN as well as message encryption?
Message encryption protects content from the sender’s device to authorised recipients. The server-to-server VPN protects the connection between relay nodes. The tunnel does not require relays to decrypt the message body, and it does not replace client authentication or recipient-key verification.
Deployment concept for a future paid corporate offering. Dedicated corporate routing, employee groups and inter-relay VPN links are not live service claims for the current testbed.
NAMES, CARDS AND KEYS
Four different jobs.
One contact.
How you recognise them
A label in your local contact list. It is presentation, not a public account name or a cryptographic identity.
How you may find them
A readable account name in the developing discovery flow. Availability depends on the current service and build; a saved result is not fresh confirmation.
How the app addresses them
A QR or contact link carries public identity and delivery information. It gives no permission to retrieve the recipient’s mailbox.
How you check the key
Compare the code through a trusted independent channel. A changed peer key clears its prior verification state.
ENCRYPTION AND DELIVERY
Content is encrypted
before the relay receives it.
Protection comes from separate layers: verifying a contact, encrypting message content, protecting the transport connection and encrypting local storage. Each layer has a specific job.
Which encryption does the current testbed use?
Protocol 0.1 uses X25519 key agreement, HKDF-SHA-256 key derivation and XChaCha20-Poly1305 authenticated encryption, with a fresh random nonce for each message. TLS protects the connection to the service; it is separate from the encryption of the message body.
The active protocol uses long-term pairwise keys and does not provide forward secrecy. Compromise of the relevant long-term private-key material can endanger recorded past messages. This remains a limitation of the current testbed.
What can the relay and network still observe?
The relay processes routing and mailbox state, encrypted envelope sizes, expiry and acknowledgments. The exact information available depends on its role. Network observers can see connection addresses, timing and traffic volume.
Keeping message content encrypted does not make all metadata invisible. A relay health check also says nothing about whether a recipient has read a particular message.
How is local history protected?
The documented clients store ciphertext message bodies within a SQLCipher-encrypted database, using an independent database key held through platform secure storage. Identity keys are protected through iOS Keychain or, on Android, a Keystore wrapping key.
Reading and composing require temporary plaintext on the device. The app clears buffers it owns across privacy boundaries, but cannot promise to erase every copy made by the operating system, keyboard or UI framework. End-to-end encryption cannot protect displayed content from an attacker controlling an unlocked endpoint.
What is being developed for the next version?
The current app is a working testbed for connectivity, encrypted delivery and application behaviour. Work and testing on the next product generation are active, including a separate session-encryption programme.
The Session 0.2 candidate remains disabled in the active client protocol. Its development tests are not a production security approval. Independent cryptographic and mobile-security review, migration and device-lifecycle evidence remain necessary before activation.
PART OF ARCTIC FRONTIER SYSTEMS
Communication.
With an operational view.
Messenger carries encrypted conversations. Relay Monitor helps an operator inspect infrastructure health and peer connections. Its measurements are separate from message content and do not prove message delivery.
Explore Relay Monitor ↗Explore Arctic Vault ↗Screens shown from the owner’s version 0.1, build 69 and the earlier build 31 testbed. In the build 31 relay capture, connection identifiers are replaced for illustration; application states are preserved. This page describes development work, not an independently audited production release.