// the find
markqvist/Reticulum
The cryptography-based networking stack for building unstoppable networks with LoRa, Packet Radio, WiFi and everything in between.
Reticulum is a networking stack built ground-up on cryptographic primitives — no IP required, though it can tunnel over IP. It targets heterogeneous physical media (LoRa, packet radio, serial, TCP/UDP) and handles routing, encryption, and link establishment in userland Python. For anyone building off-grid or mesh communication tools, it's the most complete open-source option in this space.
Link establishment costs just 3 packets / 297 bytes total, which is genuinely impressive for an encrypted, verified connection — important when your link is 250 bps LoRa. The cryptographic design is clean: X25519/Ed25519 key pairs, HKDF-derived ephemeral keys, AES-256-CBC with HMAC, no novel crypto. The interface abstraction is well-thought-out — adding a custom transport is a single Python class, and the built-in set covers almost everything real hardware actually uses. The ecosystem is real: rnsh, rncp, rngit, Sideband, Nomad Network all exist and work, so this isn't vaporware with a good README.
No external security audit on a project whose entire pitch is cryptographic trustworthiness — the README admits this directly, which is honest, but it's a real gap for anyone deploying this seriously. The Python reference implementation is the protocol definition, meaning there's no formal spec separate from the code; a bug in the implementation is a protocol bug by definition. The pure-Python cryptographic fallback (when OpenSSL isn't available) bundles several third-party pure-Python AES and curve implementations of unclear provenance — that's a supply-chain and correctness risk on constrained hardware where you're most likely to use it. Development happens in a non-public mirror, so the GitHub issue tracker and PR flow are disconnected from actual development.