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Comment by jkilpatr | Hacker News Reader

My company Althea (https://althea.net) is making open source router firmware that makes it easy to people to set up incentivized mesh networks in their communities. It allows routers to pay each other for bandwidth which means that everyone hosting a node earns money for the packets they forward.

This ends the incumbency problem by making bandwidth a commodity. Want a byte, buy a byte, switching to the best provider automatically. No software knowledge required, fully plug and play. (equipment still required, can't break the laws of RF. it's just regular WISP gear though)

Here's a talk I gave on exactly how the system is designed and implemented.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4EKbgShyLw

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1izRgUr-Tm-ixnqpd7NGW...

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Huh, how do you deal with the problem of law enforcement assuming that an IP is a single subscriber? Even if law enforcement believed it up front, it still is a hassle to the users now dealing with law enforcement requests.

The traffic goes out through an exit node so the only thing that a gateway’s ISP sees is an encrypted tunnel.

Ah ok so it’s not anything different than the existing mesh tech world, just another implementation. Thanks, I misinterpreted the grandparent comment, it sounded more like leasing existing connections and not routing them to exit points.

We are leasing the connection used to route to the exit point. If you want to think about it like that.

In general our only 'mesh tech' innovation is the mandatory WireGuard encryption for all user traffic. Which as far as I know is a first. The rest is the billing and some ease of configuration.

Yeah, I didn’t mean to imply that you didn’t innovate. I just meant that the fundamental baseline for a mesh is the same.

Looks interesting. I looked over your presentation but I am still unclear about who owns/leases the exit nodes. Could you clearly define 'exit node' for me?

Thanks

Think of it as an integrated VPN, anyone can own and operate one. They charge like any other node in the network so they can make money or at least cover costs.

The main issue is one of trust, we have left it up to the user what exit nodes to add to their system beyond a few we ship in the firmware run by ourselves.

Personally I think this is a point of weakness long term, we need to decide on criteria for including other exit servers. Trust is hard

How do we know what's in WireGuard?

I'm not sure how to parse this question. So I'll answer both interpretations.

WireGuard itself is open source, our firmware and software is open source. So if the question is about encryption/software integrity go take a look.

If it's about what traffic is routed through WireGuard the answer is all user traffic to the internet, no exceptions.

That doesn't eliminate liability. If you're knowingly trafficking illigal content you're also liable for it. Afaik the only exceptions are when the content is being moderated .

How would you knowingly transmit illegal activity if everything is encrypted?

> Afaik the only exceptions are when the content is being moderated

Depends on the type of illegal content. There is no established case law that protects you as a moderator of CP. Yes, LEO will not arrest you usually for it, but there is nothing that positively makes you safe as a moderator working to remove and report CP content.

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