Discord announces end-to-end encryption for audio and video calls

Chat platform Discord has announced it will be rolling out end-to-end encryption (E2EE) for its audio and video calls. This will come into effect for its DMs, Group DMs, voice channels, and Go Live streams.

In a blog post, the platform stated that it had implemented the new measures in a bid to protect the “privacy and data of the roughly 200 million people who use our platform every month.” The company added that “transparency is key,” hence it has released a white paper outlining the changes called the DAVE protocol. It has also introduced an open-source library which is available for public review and feedback.

Discord’s Core Tech Vice President, Mark Smith, wrote on X: “This has been a two-year journey to figure out how to build this in a way that meets our privacy, safety, and performance goals.”

He later added: “We’ll be working on this [through] the next year until we can achieve ‘100% of calls are E2EE.’”

There will be significant efforts to get our third party ecosystem updated. Bots, consoles, and the long tail of older mobile clients.

We'll be working on this thru the next year until we can achieve "100% of calls are E2EE."

— Mark Smith (@zorkian) September 17, 2024

DAVE or Discord’s Audio and Video End-to-End encryption, has five key goals. These include having private conversations, an open and effective protocol, broad platform support, transparency to users, as well as scalability and performance.

Consequently, the firm collaborated with Trail of Bits, an independent cybersecurity firm, to conduct a thorough review of both the design and implementation of DAVE. Its Messaging Layer Security (MLS) allows users to join and leave calls without seeing previous messages, instead moving into new “epochs.”

Discord also reiterated that the move would not affect the quality of calls. It stated: “Discord’s high quality, robust, low latency voice and video is not compromised by the introduction of E2EE A/V. Everyone should continue to experience Discord calls as they always have: chatting with friends without needing to think about the underlying technology and protocols.”

However, the company clarified that messages on Discord will continue to follow its content moderation approach and are not end-to-end encrypted.

It’s not the first time a messaging firm has begun to offer more privacy. ReadWrite has previously reported that WhatsApp, Signal, and iMessage have all expanded into this area.

Featured image: Discord

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