The Signal Foundation, officially the Signal Technology Foundation, is an American

non-profit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

founded in 2018 by

Moxie Marlinspike Moxie Marlinspike is an American entrepreneur, cryptographer, and computer security researcher. Marlinspike is the creator of Signal, co-founder of the Signal Technology Foundation, and served as the first CEO of Signal Messenger LLC. He is als ...

and

Brian Acton Brian Acton (born 1972/1973) is an American computer programmer and Internet entrepreneur. Acton is the executive chairman of the Signal Technology Foundation, which he co-founded with Moxie Marlinspike in 2018. , Acton also serves as inte ...

. Its mission is "to develop

open-source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...

privacy technology that protects free expression and enables secure global communication." Its subsidiary,

Signal Messenger LLC The Signal Foundation, officially the Signal Technology Foundation, is an American non-profit organization founded in 2018 by Moxie Marlinspike and Brian Acton. Its mission is "to develop open-source privacy technology that protects free expressi ...

, is responsible for the development of the

Signal In signal processing, a signal is a function that conveys information about a phenomenon. Any quantity that can vary over space or time can be used as a signal to share messages between observers. The '' IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing' ...

messaging app and the

Signal Protocol The Signal Protocol (formerly known as the TextSecure Protocol) is a non- federated cryptographic protocol that can be used to provide end-to-end encryption for voice calls and instant messaging conversations. The protocol was developed by Open ...

History

On February 21, 2018,

and

WhatsApp WhatsApp (also called WhatsApp Messenger) is an internationally available freeware, cross-platform, centralized instant messaging (IM) and voice-over-IP (VoIP) service owned by American company Meta Platforms (formerly Facebook). It allows user ...

co-founder

announced the formation of the Signal Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. The foundation was started with an initial $50 million loan from Acton, who had left WhatsApp's parent company, Facebook, in September 2017. The

Freedom of the Press Foundation Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) is a non-profit organization founded in 2012 to fund and support free speech and freedom of the press. The organization originally managed crowd-funding campaigns for independent journalistic organizations, ...

had previously served as the Signal project's fiscal sponsor and continued to accept donations on behalf of the project while the foundation's non-profit status was pending. By the end of 2018, the loan had increased to $105,000,400, which is due to be repaid on February 28, 2068. The loan is unsecured and at 0% interest.

Senior leadership

Signal Foundation has been led by a Chairman, which is separate from the leadership roles of Signal Messenger.

List of chairmen

(2018–present)

People

As of October 2020, the Signal Foundation board of directors has three members: *

Meredith Whittaker Meredith Whittaker is the president of the Signal Foundation and serves on their board of directors. She was formerly the Minderoo Research Professor at New York University (NYU), and the co-founder and faculty director of the AI Now Institute. ...

(current president, 2022-09-06)

Signal Messenger LLC

Signal Messenger LLC was founded simultaneously with the Signal Technology Foundation and operates as its subsidiary. It is responsible for the development of the

messaging app and the

. Moxie Marlinspike served as Signal Messenger's first CEO until stepping down on January 10, 2022. Brian Acton has volunteered to serve as

interim CEO Interim management is the temporary provision of management resources and skills. Interim management can be seen as the short-term assignment of a proven heavyweight interim executive manager to manage a period of transition, crisis or change wit ...

while the organization searches for a new CEO.

Senior leadership

Along with the Chairman of the Signal Foundation, Signal Messenger has been traditionally led by a CEO. This was until September 2022, when a new role of President was created, which is dedicated to more core lanes of strategy.

List of CEOs

(2018–2022) #

; interim (2022–present)

List of presidents

(2022–present)

References

External links

* {{official, https://signalfoundation.org/
"Signal Foundation"
announcement by Moxie Marlinspike and Brian Acton, 21 February 2018 Charities based in California Free software project foundations in the United States Non-profit organizations based in the San Francisco Bay Area Organizations established in 2018 2018 establishments in California Companies based in Mountain View, California Free and open-source software organizations

History

Senior leadership

List of chairmen

People

Signal Messenger LLC

Senior leadership

List of CEOs

List of presidents

References

Further reading

External links