Kim Dotcom is at it again. After his foray into New Zealand politics ended in failure and his extradition trial was set for next June, the controversial entrepreneur decided to expand his Mega platform with one more product: MegaChat. The idea is to put an end to Skype's dominance by offering text messaging and video conferencing in an encrypted way, in an attempt to block any possibility of espionage and interception.
Edward Snowden's files seem to suggest that the NSA treats Skype like its own backyard. Personally, I have a hard time imagining a terrorist using a video conferencing service like Skype, but security agencies see it differently. Skype's statistics are outdated, but the last measurement put it well above 300 million users — a simple way of saying it dominates the video call market. Still, with the NSA reading conversations like an open book, some users are not so keen on continuing to use the service. There are several alternatives on the Web, and the newest is MegaChat, a new creation from Kim Dotcom.
According to Dotcom, the Mega platform has fifteen million users, and MegaChat could boost that number to one hundred million before the end of 2015. It's currently in limited public beta, so some users may not see the option right away, but it seems MegaChat registered more than half a million calls in just a few hours. One of MegaChat's main advantages is that it works directly in the browser, without needing to download any extra software.
For now, the only thing working is the video call system. Text chat and video conferencing itself will be added "soon," if we follow another tweet from Dotcom himself. Facing the inevitable security questions that arise with a new service, staying true to his style, Dotcom doubled down and offered a reward for any independent researcher who finds flaws in MegaChat. We won't deny that Dotcom has plenty of problems ahead, but many said Mega would last a couple of months, and there it is. Will MegaChat be enough to add more users and erode Skype's power?
