Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin drops 256 ETH to boost next-generation encrypted messaging

Vitalik Buterin donates 256 ETH to two messaging apps.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said end-to-end encrypted messaging is essential for protecting digital privacy, with unauthorized account creation and metadata privacy the next major priorities for the industry.

He pointed to Session and SimpleX as two projects working in these areas and announced that he has donated 128 ETH to each of them.

Large ETH donations

In a post on X this week, Buterin said both applications seek to strengthen decentralization and improve user protection without relying on phone numbers, while also addressing challenges such as multi-device support and resistance to Sybil or denial-of-service attacks.

Buterin said the donation addresses are publicly available on the projects’ websites, adding that while the platforms are not yet perfect, they represent active efforts to promote privacy-protective communications. He also called for more developers to address the technical issues that still exist, adding that these issues “need more attention.”

It is important to note that while Signal has emerged as a widely used encrypted messaging app, it renewed investigation following a March incident in which senior U.S. national security officials accidentally included a reporter in a Signal group discussing attacks on Houthi targets in Yemen. Days later, a Pentagon-wide advisory warned against using the app for non-public information, citing a vulnerability related to the linked device feature.

The memo stated that Russian hacking groups were targeting the app’s users with phishing tactics. Signal later attributed the problem to user-targeted attacks rather than problems with its encryption, and that the company had already implemented security measures and warnings.

Buterin’s privacy push

The Ethereum co-founder has spoken repeatedly this year about treating privacy as a basic need for digital systems. Following a recent data breach involving major US banks, in which customer information from institutions such as JPMorgan, Citi and Morgan Stanley may have been exposed following a cyber attack on mortgage technology provider SitusAMC, Buterin responded by describing privacy as a form of ‘hygiene’.

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In an essay published in April, he argued that “privacy is an important safeguard for decentralization” and outlined a path for Ethereum to support stealth addresses, selective disclosure, and zero-knowledge tools at the application level to help reduce unnecessary data exposure.

More recently, he warned that X’s new geo-inference system, which assigns country labels to user accounts, poses privacy risks. He said such systems can still reveal sensitive location information and put vulnerable users at risk, even if only broad regions are made public.