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Basic Of Matrix - An open network for secure, decentralized communication
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basic-of-matrix.md

Basic Of Matrix - An open network for secure, decentralized communication

Introduction

  • Making VoIP, IP messaging and IoT as ubiquitous and flexible as email
  • What is Matrix ?
    • Matrix is an open network for secure, decentralised real-time communication
      • Open Network
        • Open Specification
        • Open Implementation
      • Secure
        • By Default End to End encryption
    • Decentralised
      • Any one can run their own matrix server
    • Matrix is an open standard for interoperable, decentralised, real-time communication over IP.
      • Open standard - Matrix Specification - https://matrix.org/docs/spec/
      • Interoperable - It is designed to interoperate with other communication systems, and being an Open Standard means it's easy to see how to interoperate with it
      • Decentralised - It means there is no central point - anyone can host their own server and have control over their data
      • Real Time - It is designed to function in real-time, which means it is ideal for building systems that require immediate exchange of data, such as Instant Messaging

Problems

  • Users are locked into proprietary communications apps
  • They have no control over or their privacy
  • Their conversation and contacts are fragmented
  • Users wants to communicate with the apps and services which they trust
  • Not be forced into specific services chosen by user contacts

Matrix is for

  • Group chat
  • One to one chat
  • Webrtc signalling
  • Bridging common silos
  • Internet of things data
  • And anything else which needs to pubsub persistent data to the world.

The Matrix Ecosystem

  • The matrix specification (Client/Server API)
  • Server Side
    • Synapse (Reference Matrix) - 1st Generation Matrix Server
    • Dendrite - 2nd Generation Matrix Server
    • Matrix Application Services & Bridges
    • Other servers and Services
  • Client Side
    • matrix-js-sdk
    • matrix-ios-sdk
    • matrix-android-sdk(java)
    • matrix-android-sdk-rx
    • Matrix-android-sdk(kotlin)
    • matrix-angular-sdk
    • matrix-react-sdk
    • MatrixKit (iOS)
    • Matrix iOS Console
    • Matrix Android Console
    • Matrix Web console
    • Other clients

Features

  • Open specification of the Matrix standard
  • Distributed and Federated network (no single party owns your conversations)
  • End to End encryptions
  • Encrypted voice and video calls using WebRTC
  • Bridge break boundaries between networks
  • Integration Widgets
  • Healthy and Friendly community

E2E Encryption

  • Encryption without open source cannot be trusted (Security by obscurity doesn’t work)
  • Without end to end encryption , Matrix’s replicated conversations history is a privacy problem.
  • More then a year is spent building decentralised E2E crypto into the heart of Matrix
  • End-to-End Encryption implementation guide - https://www.matrix.org/docs/guides/end-to-end-encryption-implementation-guide
  • End-to-end encryption in Matrix is based on the Olm and Megolm cryptographic ratchets

  • Implementation of the olm and megolm cryptographic ratchets

    • The library is written in C/C++, but is architected in a way which makes it easy to write wrappers for higher-level languages.
    • https://gitlab.matrix.org/matrix-org/olm

    • The Double Ratchet Algorithm

      • The Double Ratchet algorithm is used by two parties to exchange encrypted messages based on a shared secret key.
      • An implementation of the Double Ratchet cryptographic ratchet described by https://whispersystems.org/docs/specifications/doubleratchet/, written in C and C++11 and exposed as a C API.
      • Typically the parties will use some key agreement protocol (such as X3DH) to agree on the shared secret key.

      • X3DH (Extended Triple Diffie-Hellman)

        • X3DH establishes a shared secret key between two parties who mutually authenticate each other based on public keys.
        • X3DH provides forward secrecy and cryptographic deniability.
        • X3DH is designed for asynchronous settings where one user ("Bob") is offline but has published some information to a server.
        • Another user ("Alice") wants to use that information to send encrypted data to Bob, and also establish a shared secret key for future communication.
        • https://signal.org/docs/specifications/x3dh/
  • The specification of the Olm ratchet can be found in https://gitlab.matrix.org/matrix-org/olm/-/blob/master/docs/olm.md
  • This library also includes an implementation of the Megolm cryptographic ratchet, as specified in https://gitlab.matrix.org/matrix-org/olm/-/blob/master/docs/megolm.md

Matrix Architecture

Home Servers

Client

  • Users in Matrix use one or more clients to communicate.
  • This could be any combination of a web client, a command line client, a mobile client - or embedded clients built into existing apps.
  • It could even be a piece of hardware (e.g. a drone) that is Matrix enabled.
  • Client Server API
  • simple lightweight API to let clients send messages and control rooms
  • synchronise conversation history
  • It is designed to support both lightweight clients which store no state and lazy-load data from the server as required - as well as heavyweight clients which maintain a full local persistent copy of server state.
  • https://matrix.org/docs/spec/client_server/latest

Application Servers

  • Application services are passive and can only observe events from homeserver.
  • Application Services to help you create new communication solutions or extend the capabilities and reach of existing ones
  • Defines how to extend the functionality of Matrix with 'integrations' and bridge to other networks

  • Application Server API

    • Have privileged access to the server
    • Can subscribe to server traffic to provide custom application logic
    • Can masquerade as virtual users
    • The Application Service API (AS API) defines a standard API to allow such extensible functionality to be implemented irrespective of the underlying homeserver implementation.
    • https://matrix.org/docs/spec/application_service/latest

  • Integration API

    • You can embed some widget in room like Etherpad
    • You can integrate bots in room like RSS feed
    • Monitoring tool integration like Grafana
    • Video call conferencing API integration like Jitsi

  • Bridges

    • Unique feature of matrix to unite different networks together
    • Bridge Type
      • Bridgebot
        • Exchange messages with a remote network is to have the bridge log into the network using one or more predefined users called bridge bots
      • Puppeted
        • Matrix user has to already have a valid account on the remote system

Identity Servers

  • A Matrix "Identity" describes both the user ID and any other existing IDs from third party namespaces linked to their account.
  • "Identity Servers" (IS) be used to verify the 3PID and persist and replicate the mappings.

Getting Started

Synapse

Installation Instructions

Try Matrix Now

References

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