1. Session Messenger
Source: Session Messenger FAQ
Source: Arguments against Session Messenger
Loki: Is basiscally Tor for rich people
Session Messenger would not go down if seed nodes were destroyed, though it would create temporary disruptions for new users trying to connect.
Here's how it would work:
Initial impact on new users: Seed nodes are bootstrap points that help new users find and connect to the decentralized network. If all seed nodes were destroyed, new users would have difficulty joining the network initially since they wouldn't have a starting point to discover peers.
Existing users unaffected: Users already connected to the network would continue to function normally. Their clients maintain direct peer-to-peer connections with other users and nodes, so they wouldn't depend on seed nodes to keep messaging.
Recovery and resilience: The decentralized nature of Session Messenger means that:
- New seed nodes could be deployed relatively quickly by the community
- Users could potentially connect manually by knowing the address of at least one existing peer on the network
- The network's distributed architecture is specifically designed to be resistant to this kind of centralized attack
The key distinction: Session's design acknowledges that some bootstrap infrastructure is necessary, but the actual message routing and peer-to-peer communication happens across the distributed network. Destroying seed nodes would be more of an inconvenience than a fatal blow—it would slow adoption and create friction for newcomers, but wouldn't collapse the network for active participants.
This is actually one of the arguments proponents make for decentralized messenger systems: they're theoretically more resilient to government or corporate infrastructure takedowns compared to services relying on centralized data centers.