We might not be cavemen anymore, but humans crave connection and security, even in the [digital] ecosystems of today…

Once upon a time, when humanity was young, being able to trust the members of your tribe would mean the difference between life and death.

Striving to survive in a tense, inhospitable environment, humans banded together to provide emotional and physical security for one another.

We might not have had a word for it yet, but the foundation of our primitive societies, was trust.

The definition of trust is “firm belief in the reliability, truth, or ability of someone or something.”

More than just an ethical concept to reach for, trust (or the lack of) is fundamental when applied to human relationships and interactions.

In those early societies, trust between individuals literally meant watching each other’s backs for predators and hazards.

Then so as the human capacity for relationships, production, commerce, and self-actualisation evolved, our application of and need for trust beyond the physical, progressed.

In the early centuries of human history when trade was key, whilst written literacy remained rare, a man’s word was his bond.

Trust now equaled communicating the truth. (It’s no wonder that there are commandments against lying in the Bible, Torah and Quran.)

Move on to the Middle Ages, when the most popular form of private communication was official messengers on horseback.

Entrusted with letters sealed with wax and personal symbol seals, the goal was both to prove the identity of the sender and assure the recipient that the message had not been intercepted on route.

To connect on confidential matters of importance now relied on knowing that the written word of another was true.

Now fast forward to the 21st century for the World Wars.

Here encrypted communication stepped into the spotlight as the would-be solution for trusting that your message would end up read by the recipient’s eyes only…

That is, until the codes were cracked.

So where are we now then in the era of digital communication?

We chat, text message, call, and video call; not write on scrolls sealed with wax.

We don’t handpick loyal, honest messengers — we utilise corporate businesses like Facebook who read, store and profit from our personal information.

We might encrypt our messages, like with WhatsApp, but they’re still held by a stranger in the middle.

Our psychological needs for connection, security and trust remain the same, but the centralised communication options utilised by the mainstream simply don’t meet them (as has recently become much more obvious!)

Fortunately the next wave of evolution has arrived — decentralised communication. This is a movement to reinstate trust in human communicaton by removing the centralised ‘middleman’; thereby putting the user back in the driver’s seat.

Among them, the Sylo decentralised communication app, or DApp, will offer secure chat, video calling and much, much more, all based on the belief that users should be in the driving seat, not the service provider.

Sylo Beta DApp

The decentralised architecture of Sylo means that the only people who’ll read your messages are you and the recipient. And that you can trust.

Feel the need to delve deeper? Check out the Sylo DApp here.

Make sure you keep an eye out for the out for the imminent release of the Sylo Beta DApp in coming months. You’ll find announcements, plus answers to your questions, here on the Sylo Telegram channel now.