I spent about a week last November setting up a matrix server on my own server (also my home router). It's like a chat server, but you can also do video and voice calls with it. It's also completely private, it runs on my own server thru a cloudflare tunnel on my account using my Starlink internet. Everyone that uses it has their own encryption keys so nobody else can read anything. If you know what discord is, this is the open source, private equivalent and I invite ALL of you to come join and chat on it. Taters left discord and while he's a fag for that, discord is also fake and gay.

You must contact me privately to setup an account for you. Email me - [email protected]

I have to run a command on the server to create your account and set the first password. That way, if you have a problem joining you can just ask me that way.

There are many chat clients to use, but I recommend the regular matrix or sometimes called element matrix with the green icon.

Grok's explaination of how the encryption works in plain english;

How private messaging works on this server

Encrypted chats use end-to-end encryption. Each person’s device creates and holds cryptographic keys. Messages are encrypted on the sender’s device before they leave, and only decrypted on the recipients’ devices.

The homeserver (the computer that runs the chat service) stores and forwards those encrypted messages. It does not have the keys needed to decrypt them. Running the server does not grant the ability to read private room contents.

Because the keys stay with the users’ devices:

• The server operator cannot read encrypted messages.
• Someone who only gains access to the server generally sees ciphertext, not plain text.
• The app vendor and other third parties also do not hold those keys for normal private rooms.

What the server can see is metadata needed to operate the service (for example account identifiers, room membership, and that messages were sent), not the decrypted content of end-to-end encrypted conversations.

Security depends on protecting devices and recovery material (passwords, recovery keys, verified sessions). Losing that material can mean losing access to history; sharing it with someone else can let them read messages.

In short: encrypted messages are sealed for the conversation participants. Hosting the server is delivery infrastructure, not a master key to the contents.