Pubky Protocol
Federated Protocol
Company
Details
License MIT (confirmed directly against the pubky-homeserver, react-native-pubky, and pkarr repos — not stated on the pubky.org marketing site itself)
Dev Status 🟢 Active
Owner Synonym (maintainer); Tether Company backing noted via footer attribution on pubky.org
Owner - List
- Tether Holdings
Governing Body Synonym (no independent standards body; single-maintainer protocol)
Country Unconfirmed (Synonym; Tether Company backing)
Start Year 2023
Stack Rust (homeserver, core SDK); JS/WASM (@synonymdev/pubky npm SDK); React Native (@synonymdev/react-native-pubky)
Funding Tether Company backing (noted via footer attribution); no disclosed funding round figures
Last Investigated Oct 28, 2026
Federated Protocol Attributes
Owner - List
- Tether Holdings
Origins Personal data sovereignty / P2P identity — public-key-based identity with DHT-based discovery, avoiding both centralized platform lock-in and DNS-registrar dependency (unlike Solid's WebID)
Database Homeserver-hosted (per-user data store served over HTTP; PKARR/Mainline DHT used only for discovery pointers, not data storage)
Query Language HTTP/REST (homeserver API); no separate query language
Data Formats Arbitrary (homeserver stores arbitrary user data/files served over HTTP; no mandated schema)
Collaborative Live Editing N/A (protocol-level; application-dependent)
Rich Text Editing N/A (protocol-level; application-dependent)
Mobile Support Yes (@synonymdev/react-native-pubky SDK)
Web Support Yes (pubky.app, Explorer, mapky.app, eventky.app all web-based)
Native Apps Yes (Rust core + JS/WASM + React Native SDKs support native app integration)
Terms Self-hosting (run own homeserver) + hosted homeserver providers; identity (keypair) and homeserver are separable, matching the protocol's "credible exit" design
Funds Undisclosed
Based On PKARR (Public Key Addressable Resource Records) for homeserver discovery via BitTorrent Mainline DHT; standard HTTP/REST for data serving
Content Addressing No (homeserver data addressed by HTTP path; PKARR records addressed by the owning public key, not content hash)
E2EE Not stated as a protocol-level guarantee (application-dependent); transport is standard HTTPS
Signature Ed25519 keypair-based identity and authentication
Permissions Homeserver-defined (per-homeserver access control over hosted data)
Semantic Web Compatibility Not stated (arbitrary data storage, no mandated RDF/Linked-Data layer, unlike Solid)
Federation Model Homeserver-based (analogous to Solid Pods): any homeserver can serve any keypair-identified user; discovery is DHT-based rather than DNS/WebFinger; apps and homeservers are decoupled
Instance / Server Requirements Low to moderate (homeserver designed to be self-hostable; Docker Stack and CLI tooling provided)
Account Portability Full portability by design — "credible exit" is the protocol's own stated core value proposition: switch homeserver providers without losing data or identity
Discovery / Relay Architecture PKARR-based: Ed25519 keypair signs DNS-style records published as BEP44 mutable items on the BitTorrent Mainline DHT; HTTP-to-DHT relay gateways bridge browser/UDP-restricted clients
Server Authority Model User-controlled identity, homeserver-controlled data custody unless self-hosted — keypair identity is independent of any single homeserver's authority
Protocol Maturity / Standardization No formal standards-body process; single-maintainer (Synonym) reference implementation; live production components alongside actively-developed pieces
Data Sovereignty User-controlled (keypair-based identity independent of hosting provider; credible exit between homeservers)
Relationships
How this tool connects to other tools and organizations, from relationships reviewed by the OpenHaven data steward. They describe how projects connect, not how good they are.
- Based on
- Developed by
- Tether Holdings
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