Hi, I'm Alex.
I have been a software engineer for eight years, and I am passionate about privacy and anonymity. I firmly believe that private conversations with family and the people you love are a human right, and a privilege far too often undervalued.
Zuno is a one-person project: I design and build the app and this website, and I run the open-source server it connects to. No team, no investors.
Where it started
I have always been wary of big tech. Not only of what large companies do with what they collect, but of what happens when it leaks, and of backdoors that give secret access to places a company says it cannot reach.
Those worries are why I first set up my own server, just for my family and friends. Running it myself meant I no longer had to take anyone's word for who could read the messages my family and I sent.
Why Zuno
Talking with people over the years, I realized that more of them, and whole communities, take their privacy seriously every day but do not know where to turn. Running their own server is rarely an option, so they stay with large companies whose business comes first.
Running my own server also meant trying every app that could connect to it, and none of them stuck. Each was missing something that matters: notifications that arrive, calls that connect, and in some cases group calls at all. The one I used longest was no longer being actively improved.
A good chat app should be fast and reliable, and just as easy to use and understand for people who are not technical.
Zuno grew out of both: the server I ran for my own family, and the app I could not find. It is for anyone, without running a server of their own.
What I hold myself to
I would rather Zuno be designed so that I cannot read your messages than ask you to trust that I will not. The server I run sees that one username talks to another, and when, but never what is said. Accounts need no email or phone number, so a username does not have to say who you are.
As surveillance keeps growing, and transparency laws are passed without people having a say in the matter, I would rather support smaller, more ethical projects than wait for big tech to change. Zuno is my way of building one.
Four ideas behind Zuno
- A safe place for your people
- Friends and family talk without being watched.
- An alternative to surveillance
- Messaging should not be a data business, and Zuno is here to counter that.
- Privacy without effort
- Strong protection that feels like any other chat app.
- Independence
- No ads, no investors, nothing to sell. I pay for everything out of my own pocket, and donations help cover the running costs. They unlock nothing.
Timeline
What is done, and what comes next. Planned items have no dates yet.
August 2026
Work begins
The first version of Zuno, with end-to-end encryption on by default.
September 2026
Its own server
Zuno gets a single, independent server that shares messages with no other.
Next
Android launch
Zuno arrives on Google Play.
Planned
iPhone app
Zuno on the App Store, after the Android launch and once I get my hands on a Mac and an iPhone to test it on.
Get in touch
Questions or feedback? Write to me at hello@zuno.aleeas.com.