Vitalik Buterin backs Session and SimpleX with major privacy donation

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Yaroslav Dmytrenko

27.11.2025

Vitalik Buterin backs Session and SimpleX with major privacy donation — Buterin donates $765 000 to privacy-focused messaging apps

Vitalik Buterin has donated $765,000 in ETH to two private messaging applications, emphasizing that such projects are “critically important for preserving our digital privacy.”

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin supported two confidential messaging apps aiming to challenge industry leaders like Signal and Telegram.

Privacy has become a major topic in the crypto industry. In October, the Ethereum Foundation created a dedicated privacy team, and now Buterin has once again highlighted the importance of privacy by donating $765,000 in ETH to the messaging apps Session and SimpleX.

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“Encrypted messaging like Signal is critically important for preserving our digital privacy,” Buterin wrote on Twitter. “The next two important steps in this space are (i) permissionless accounts and (ii) metadata privacy. Session and SimpleX are two messengers pushing these directions,” Vitalik wrote on his X page.

Session positions itself as a decentralized, end-to-end encrypted messenger aiming for “minimal metadata leakage”—metadata being the information surrounding the content itself, such as an IP address or message timestamp. The app also has a token, SESH, which surged 370% in a single day, reaching a $15 million market cap.

SimpleX is also a decentralized, end-to-end encrypted messenger, though it focuses primarily on users owning their “identity data, contacts, and communities.” Next year, the company will introduce “vouchers” that users must purchase and donate to communities—such as the Bitcoin community—to support the servers required for the platform’s operation.

“Neither of these products is perfect software,” Buterin cautioned, adding that both “still have a long way to go” in improving user experience and security.

Privacy Is hygiene

Interest in privacy-focused apps and crypto projects has surged in recent months as governments tighten control over digital spaces.

During this period, privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies have also seen sharp price increases. For example, according to CoinGecko, Zcash has skyrocketed 793% over the past year, reaching $501, despite a 27% decline over the past week.

“People increasingly live in digital spaces. These spaces are subject to levels of surveillance that have no analog in the physical world,” Zak Williamson, co-founder of the privacy-centric Ethereum Layer-2 network Aztec Network, told Decrypt.

According to Williamson, privacy is essential so that people “can act freely in their online interactions, rather than being digital commodities whose data is collected, sold to the highest bidder, and weaponized against user interests.”

Vitalik Buterin has also become increasingly vocal in advocating for privacy solutions within the crypto industry.

“Privacy is hygiene,” the Ethereum creator said in response to the recent banking data leak scandal in the United States.

Over the weekend, hackers stole data linked to several major financial institutions, including JPMorgan, Citi, and Morgan Stanley. The breach occurred due to unauthorized access to systems belonging to mortgage technology provider SitusAMC, exposing “accounting records and legal agreements,” along with other confidential information.

As we wrote, Vitalik Buterin signals shifts in Ethereum gas policies for 2024

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